Today we celebrate our 100th post on this blog! It has been an interesting journey for us so far; and we realize that we have only begun this ride, a ride with no destination but to enrich ourselves with wisdom and knowledge through discussions and by sharing thoughts. And you, our readers, are a very […]
If you haven’t read the excellent articles by Michael Bolton regarding Testing vs. Checking yet, now is a good time to do it: http://www.developsense.com/blog/2009/08/testing-vs-checking/ http://www.developsense.com/blog/2009/09/transpection-and-three-elements-of/ http://www.developsense.com/blog/2009/09/pass-vs-fail-vs-is-there-problem-here/ Done? One thing that struck me with this is that the more testing you do will result in less testing and more checking. I.e., the more you test, the more […]
Session based testing is most often discussed in combination with exploratory testing. The idea is to make exploratory testing more structured by using it, as James Bach expresses it. I like the whole concept about testing in sessions, thus breaking the day into chunks of work. Considering that you know that there is an infinite set of […]
Now and then I read that testers don’t know enough about Usability, that there is a need for a Performance Testing expert, that a Security consultant should be called in, or that a master of the used technology would make Installation and Compatibility testing possible. This might be true in the general case, but there […]
Let me begin by saying that these are my beliefs ever since I took the ISEB/ISTQB certification. But when I thought of this recently, I think I need to make a statement and try to help all those that are rejected because they are not certified. ————————————– In the search for a qualifying certification many […]
I use Jerry Weinberg’s definition of quality: “Quality is value to some person”; and I use Cem Kaner’s extension to the definition so that it becomes “Quality is value to some person (that matters)”… I.e. quality is inherently subjective. And there are a lot of persons that are affected by software that we produce… With this in […]
In order to become a successful inquisitive tester, there are a couple of things you can do to improve your skills beyond the more common quest to “question a product”. One important thing is to question the tests themselves. ——————– Have you ever run tests and wondered if they were really necessary, perhaps knowing that the tests […]
When you come up with a new test idea, you are using your knowledge and experience, but there is also some sort of stimuli that triggers the idea. Something you see, hear, understand or think about. You seldom think in totally new ways, you rather combine things in a new way. These are my favorite […]
It cannot be exactly defined what a bug is, or how it should be reported. And each tester, developer, project manager et.al. has her own way of writing, thinking about and handling bugs. I like to think of this as taste. Do you prefer having all details in a bug report, or only including what […]
When working as a consultant you must live up to the paradox that: You should already be specialised and competent enough to get a contract i.e. best of all candidates for the job; but in order to stay alive in business you need to be as general as possible in order to meet the criteria […]