STARWEST 2005 - Software Testing Conference

PRESENTATIONS

Open SourceTest Automation Frameworks

Open source software has come a long way in the past few years. However, for automated testing there still are not many ready-made solutions. Testers often must spend their time working on test cases rather than working on a test automation framework. Allen Hutchison describes the elements of an automated test framework and demonstrates a framework that you can quickly assemble from several open source software tools. He then explains how to put the pieces together with a scripting language such as Perl.
Allen Hutchison, Google
Outsourcing Testing: Is it Worth The Headaches?

Although offshoring is becoming a business necessity, we've all heard the nightmare scenario. A company wants to save money by using lower-priced engineers in foreign locales for testing projects, but the quality and management problems are so extreme that the company winds up wishing it had just kept the testing in house. Alym Rayani shares the concrete steps you can take to ensure a good outsourcing experience: determining what should be outsourced, selecting a vendor, handling relations between cultures and leaders, and much more.
Alym Rayani, Symbio
Performance Testing Early in Development Iterations

When the software architecture is emerging and many features are not yet ready, performance testing is a challenge. However, waiting until the software is almost finished is too risky. What to do? Neill McCarthy explores how performance testing can be made more Agile and run starting in the early iterations of development. Learn how to implement early performance automation using appropriate tools in build tests and the requirements for early performance testing of user stories.
Neill McCarthy, BJSS
Quality Assurance and Testing in an FDA Regulated Environment

How can we reduce costs associated with FDA imposed computer systems validation (CSV) guidelines and improve test coverage at the same time? Experienced in the use of automated testing tools in FDA regulated environments, Eric Toburen shares the challenges of complying with FDA validation guidelines. For many companies, manual CSV is a like a heavy boat anchor that slows projects and increases costs while adding no value other than the perception that the practice avoids an auditor's attention.
Eric Toburen, Genilogix
Risk: The Testers Favorite Four Letter Word

Identifying risk is important-but managing risk is vital. Good project managers speak the language of risk, and their understanding of risk guides important decisions. Testers can contribute to an organization's decision making ability by speaking that same language. Learn from Julie Gardiner how to evaluate risk in both quantitative and qualitative ways. Julie will discuss how to deal with some of the misconceptions managers have about risk-based testing including: Testing is always risk-based.
Julie Gardiner, QST Consultants Ltd.
Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance: Burden or Opportunity for QA?

Did they have to create more work for IT? There is no doubt that Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) and similar compliance regulations have created a significant new workload for IT departments, including many QA/Test groups. Companies that have gone through initial compliance of SOX now must deal with the new challenge of its ongoing maintenance.
Rutesh Shah, InfoStretch Corporation
Security Nirvana - Combining Source Code Scanning and Penetration Testing

Penetrate and Patch. That's the unspoken model that many software development teams have been following for the past several years: build it, and when a security problem is found, then scurry around to patch it. We now know that the cost of building software this way is orders of magnitude more expensive than ingraining security throughout the development lifecycle.
Ady Kakrania, Security Innovation LLC
STARWEST 2005: Apprenticeships: A Forgotten Concept in Testing Training

The system of apprenticeship was first developed in the late Middle Ages. The uneducated and inexperienced were employed by a master craftsman in exchange for formal training in a particular craft. So why does apprenticeship seldom happen within software testing? Do we subconsciously believe that just about anyone can test software? Join Lloyd Roden and discover what apprenticeship training is and-even more importantly-what it is not. Learn how this practice can be easily adapted to suit software testing.
Lloyd Roden, Grove Consultants
STARWEST 2005: Interpersonal Skills for Working with Business Stakeholders

As a professional test manager or test engineer, you must keep up with the latest test techniques, management practices, and systems technologies. But that is not enough. You also must interact with-and more importantly learn to influence-executive managers and other non-technical project stakeholders. Even today in many companies, testing and test management are not well understood and are under-appreciated by non-technical people. Now is the time for you to take action and do more than simply "get along" in your organization.
Robert Sabourin, AmiBug.com Inc
STARWEST 2005: Lightning Talks: A Potpourri of 5-Minute Presentations

Lightning Talks are nine five-minute talks in a fifty-minute time period. Lightning Talks represent a much smaller investment of time than track speaking and offer the chance to try conference speaking without the heavy commitment. Lightning Talks are an opportunity to present your single biggest bang-for-the-buck idea quickly. Use this as an opportunity to give a first time talk or to present a new topic for the first time.
Erik Petersen, Emprove

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