Women in Test: Ash Coleman
The Women in Test Series
Women in Test is a series focused on women in the software testing world, and the ways they advocate for inclusivity and diversity in the discipline. The software industry has traditionally been a homogeneous field, but as we know, times …
Maximizing Load and Performance Testing Efficiency in an Agile Environment
A given of the Waterfall development methodology was that load and performance testing were done at the end of the development cycle. Both required the entire system to be integrated and its functionality verified in order to produce meaningful results.
Issues in performance times for …
Outsourced Software QA Testing – 4 Rules to Guide Your Management Strategy
Whether you are working as part of an outsourced team or you’re in-house managing an outsourced resource there is one aspect that rings true about both experiences. That is, poorly defined expectations for outsourced partners will derail your project. And, the communication skills of all …
Test Script Maintenance is Mission Critical for Your Test Automation Program
What happens to old tests? In short, they don’t just fade away. A major challenge of test coverage management is making sure that system verification test suites don’t get clogged with redundant or worse, obsolete tests.
Manual test operations tend to rapidly cull test cases …
Software QA in an Agile World: Achieving Agile Testing
Software Quality Assurance (SQA) — a planned and systematic approach to the evaluation of the quality of and adherence to software product standards, processes, and procedures.
Agile development is the concept of churning out a continuous stream of product releases, most of which are expected …
Holding a QA-Focused Retrospective to Build Better Software
Is quality assurance important to your product? How about to your brand? If the answer is yes—and I hope it is—then perhaps it’s time to think about offering your QAs the spotlight at the retrospective table.
What’s the definition of a retrospective? A retrospective is …
Exploratory Testing in an Agile Environment
If automated testing is the backbone of agile testing, then exploratory testing is the heart. Like any ‘good heart’, agile exploratory testing seeks to understand the ‘why’ and ‘how’ of a user experience (UX) through empathy. To be successful, both developers and testers must explore …
E-Commerce Website Testing: Tips to Transform Your Process
E-Commerce connects buyers and sellers through Internet websites. As opposed to informational sites, e-commerce systems are designed to directly interact with customers who are looking for quick access to product/service information with equally rapid and accurate purchase options. Notice the emphasis on rapid interaction.
E-Commerce …
Creating Better Software Through Design Thinking
If you haven’t heard of design thinking yet, odds are you will soon. Where business is concerned, design thinking is no longer something done just by the creatives of an organization. And, it does not simply mean ‘build pixel perfect wireframes’. Design thinking is a …
API Testing: Advice, Pointers, Insights
API is code engineer shorthand for ‘Application Programming Interface’ and the name describes its function nicely. An API is an interface to an application that is used by programmers rather than directly by users. API usage is through precisely crafted middleware code that accesses various …
Exploratory Testing vs. Scripted Testing: A Battle of Testing Heavyweights
Let’s talk about the benefits of exploratory testing vs scripted testing, and the ‘ad hoc’ debate. In the context of software testing it’s interesting to parse the 16th century Latin roots of this modern idiom. Today, the phrase ad hoc is often synonymous with sloppy …
Defect Management is a Powerful Ally in the Fight to Produce Quality Software
A bug is typically considered to be the result of a coding error where a defect is used as a broad term covering any deviation from the system’s business requirements. These terms tend to be used interchangeably and both indicate faults that need to be …