STAREAST 2006 - Software Testing Conference

PRESENTATIONS

Don't Whine - Build Your Own Test Tools

The highly customized hardware-software system making up the new flight operations system for the world's largest airline did not lend itself to off-the-shelf tools for test automation. With a convergence of on-demand, highly available technologies and the requirement to make the new system compatible with hundreds of legacy applications, the test team was forced to build their own test software. Written in Java, these tools have helped increase test coverage and improved the efficiency of the test team.
Clay Bailey, IBM
Five Core Metrics to Guide the Testing Endgame

By its very nature, the endgame of software projects is a hostile environment. Typical dynamics include release pressure, continuous bug discovery, additional requirements, exhausted development teams, frenzied project managers, and "crunch mode"-a politically correct term for unpaid overtime. Although testing teams are usually in the thick of this battle, they usually do not do enough to help guide the project in this critical stage.
Robert Galen, RGCG, LLC
Hallmarks of a Great Tester

As a manager, you want to select and develop people with the talents to become great testers, the ability to learn the skills of great testers, and the willingness to work hard in order to become great testers. As an individual, you aspire to become a great tester. So, what does it take? Michael Hunter reveals his twenty hallmarks of a great tester from personality traits-curiosity, courage, and honesty-to skills-knowing where to find more bugs, writing precise bug reports, and setting appropriate test scope.
Michael Hunter, Microsoft Corporation
Inside The Masters' Mind: Describing the Tester's Art

Exploratory testing is both a craft and a science. It requires intuition and critical thinking. Traditional scripted test cases usually require much less practice and thinking, which is perhaps why, in comparison, exploratory testing is often seen as "sloppy," "random," and "unstructured." How, then, do so many software projects routinely rely on it as an approach for finding some of its most severe bugs?
Jon Bach, Quardev Laboratories
ISQTB Certification: Setting the Standard for Tester Professionalism

Sandra Bourgeois has 25 years experience as an IT professional project manager, test manager, developer and QA lead. She is a Director and Project Manager at MassMutual
Financial Services in Springfield, Mass. For the past three years she has functioned as the senior IT Test Manager at MassMutual, working with a variety of large projects to
identify and resolve testing roadblocks to project implementation. She also serves as a project manager and teaches classes on testing topics, focusing on Performance
Rex Black, Rex Black Consulting
Managing Successful Outsourcing Projects

Global teams are increasingly becoming a reality with advancement in networking and internet technologies. You may have part of your team on west coast, east coast, in Europe or Asia. Although global teams seem to be a great way to bring diverse talent and to improve time-to-market, many projects actually fail to deliver on promises. An exception is the MSN Messenger team.
Samir Shah, Microsoft Corporation
Model-Based Security Testing

Preventing the release of exploitable software defects is critical for all applications. Traditional software testing approaches are insufficient, and generic tools are incapable of properly targeting your code. We need to detect these defects before going live, and we need a methodology for detection that is cost-efficient and practical. A model-based testing strategy can be applied directly to the security testing problem.
Kyle Larsen, Microsoft Corporation
PairWise Testing: A Best Practice that Isn't

By evaluating software based on its form, structure, content, and documentation, you can use static analysis to test code within a program without actually running or executing the program. Static analysis testing helps us stop defects from entering the code stream in the first place rather than waiting for the costly and time-consuming manual intervention of testing to find defects.
James Bach, Satisfice Inc
Patterns for Reusable Test Cases

You can think of Q-Patterns as a structured set of questions (tests) about the different aspects of a software application under test. They are questions about the system that are categorized, grouped, sorted, and saved for reuse. These Q-Pattern questions can be written ahead of time and stored in a repository of test case templates, developed for requirements and design reviews or built in real-time as a way to both guide and document exploratory testing sessions.
Vipul Kocher, PureTesting
Progressive Performance Testing: Adapting to Changing Conditions

An inflexible approach to performance testing is a prelude to disaster. "What you see at the start isn't always what you get in the end," says Jeff Jewell. Based on his experience performance testing applications on numerous consulting projects, Jeff demonstrates the challenges you may face testing your applications and how to overcome these obstacles.
Jeff Jewell, ProtoTest LLC

Pages

AgileConnection is a TechWell community.

Through conferences, training, consulting, and online resources, TechWell helps you develop and deliver great software every day.