thoughts from the test eye

Imagine that you run a software consultant shop where you take on projects for customers. The projects cover such areas as new software development; implementations of IT systems; and web site development. Let’s say that you are about to create a offer for a new project to a customer. Do you dare to specify the […]

I assume you are familiar with the discussion around checks vs testing brought to you by Michael Bolton, which I agree with. With configuration I mean settings on a unit such as settings for whatever you are testing. This can be configuration heavy devices such as switch, router or similar using SNMP, applications using the registry or applications using […]

A lot of these ideas come from Peopleware by Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister. As I see it, they realised it is easier to show things that will stop the growth instead of listing things that will actually create the team. Jelled teams are created when many of the factors have been eliminated that stop […]

At EuroStar 2008 I presented Testing is an Island – A Software Testing Dystopia. Fritz shot the pictures, Henrik wrote the music, and I uploaded it on YouTube: The accompanying paper can be found at http://www.thetesteye.com/papers/redgren_testingisanisland.doc

How would a test plan be constructed that is for exploratory testing? I would assume it is different from a traditional test plan? Would we use concepts such as entry/exit criteria for test? I would never say No to a build to test. Skipping entry/exit criteria. I guess it also has to do with the […]

Last week I attended SAST VÄST seminar (Gothenburg section of Swedish Assocation for Software Testing) with two interesting presentations. One of them was about experiences of TPI, Test Process Improvement, and a sneak peek of the improved TPI Next. I am not fond of TPI, or TMM, or CMM, or anything else that tries to […]

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 […]

There are some things about software testing that are special, but not unique: * you are never done, and there is always something to do * you have to be creative very often * you are dependent on new, different and conflicting technologies, users, objectives It’s not easy to be a tester, thank God for […]

I just want to promote a really good blog post written by Michael Bolton where he describes the difference between Testing and Checking: http://www.developsense.com/2009/08/testing-vs-checking.html I wish that many managers, testers and developers read this post… Cheers, Henrik

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 […]