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A Whodunit? Testing Lessons from the Great Detectives What can we learn from Sherlock Holmes, Quincy, Joe Friday, Dick Tracy, Lt. Colombo, MacGyver, and other famous detectives to help your team become great testers? Holmes used deductive reasoning-a must for bug isolation and exploratory testing. Quincy’s forte was forensic analysis-perfect for cause-and-effect testing. Friday was persistent and regimented-practical for process-oriented software QA. Dick Tracy would employ a head-on attack to find nasty bugs. Colombo would trick the system into revealing a defect by acting naïve. And MacGyver would adapt available tools and resources to creatively solve testing problems. Robert Sabourin examines the persona of great detectives and how you can apply their approaches to test real-world testing applications for Web, e-commerce, and all complex IT software projects. Help your test team become great detectives, too!
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Robert Sabourin, AmiBug.com Inc
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High Volume Test Automation Most test design starts from the premise that extensive testing is not possible--too may tests, not enough time. What if we could generate millions of tests, execute them, and evaluate them automatically. This would dramatically change your approach to test planning. Learn how to perform this style of automation using free scripting tools (such as Ruby or Python) that are reasonably priced and easy to learn. Also, to use the system test automation tool you already use (but in a different way) or collaborating with your developers to build test diagnostics and execution support into the software. Cem Kaner describes several examples of high volume automated testing, lays out a structure for thinking about this style of testing, and suggests ideas for trying it in your shop.
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Cem Kaner, Florida Institute of Technology
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Testing "Best Practices": From Microsoft's Context to Yours Testing is a never-ending series of trade-off decisions, what to test and what not to test; when to stop testing and release the product; how to budget your testing resources for automated vs. manual testing; how much code coverage is good enough; and much more. To make these difficult judgement calls, we often turn to the "best practices" recommended by testing experts and others who have encountered similar problems. The key to successful implementation is matching their "best practices" to your own context (team make-up, company culture, market
environment, etc.). Barry Preppernau shares his insights gathered from over 20 years of testing experience at Microsoft. You'll learn about the tools and processes that have been successful within Microsoft and ways for you to identify, adapt, and implement successful test improvement
initiatives within your organization.
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Barry Preppernau, Microsoft Corporation
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Becoming a Trusted Advisor to Senior Management How can Test Managers present information about test results so that the correct message is received by decision-makers? Testing generates a huge amount of raw data, which must be analyzed, processed, summarized, and presented to management so the best decisions can be made quickly. Lloyd Roden shares his experiences as a test manager and as a consultant about communicating with and disseminating information to various levels of senior management. Develop your skills to become a "trusted advisor" to senior management rather than the "bearer of bad news". Find out innovative ways to keep the information flowing to and from management and avoid losing control of the test process, particularly near the delivery date. Learn the seven monitoring techniques Lloyd recommends for reporting on different aspects of the system under test.
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Lloyd Roden, Grove Consultants
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Quick Start to Quality - Five Important Test Support Practices As testers, we understand the virtues of clear equirements, effective configuration management, software inspections and reviews, project planning, and project tracking. But how does your test group influence the organization to improve in these areas? Sometimes the test group has to use shortcuts, partial implementations, and even a clandestine approach to get things done. Louise Tamres describes the practical strategies she has used to help software organizations quickly improve product quality by addressing these five critical development practices.
- Use system test cases to identify missing and ambiguous requirements
- Help people focus on defect detection, even when they do not practice formal reviews and inspections
- Shortcuts to jumpstart process improvement in an immature organization
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Louise Tamres, The Tamres Group
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A Day in the Life of a Test Manager During every project, test managers face many issues and challenges and often have to make difficult judgement calls. From his thirteen years of experience in testing and management at a large bank and the past seven years as a consultant to test managers, Clive Bates shares the five key areas he believes are the cornerstones for success. Learn how to promote the value of testing, develop and use practical estimation techniques, build your team while working with others in your organization, use simple metrics to monitor testing, and conduct post-project reviews as the foundation for process improvement.
- Key areas for success as a test manager
- Tips for introducing changes in these key areas
- How to make the case for these practices to management and your peers
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Clive Bates, Grove Consultants
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Testing A Complex Multi-Media System wiht Action Words Testing games is in many ways similar to testing many complex, multi-media applications. In this hands-on presentation, Hans Buwalda demonstrates practical ways to automatically test a game using an intelligent, model-driven robot. Learn a straightforward technique using action words that you can apply in a wide variety of complex testing situations. The only technology you need to get started is an everyday spreadsheet program such as Microsoft Excel. Find out how combining a simple model of your application with the action word approach can measurably improve your testing.
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Hans Buwalda, LogiGear Corporation
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What You Need to Know About Testing Web Services With Web services touted as revolutionary technology for eBusiness, many companies are beginning to add this dynamic element to their internal and external Web applications. If your company is deploying Web services, you need a new test plan for your application. Rather than the usual independent tester approach, testing Web services requires a cross-functional team of developers, testers, and performance engineers in an interactive, iterative development and testing cycle. Learn what to ask and when to ask it before you roll-out your first application using Web Services.
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Deb Kablotsky, RadView Software Inc
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Automate the Right Things First Not every test automation project should be done and not all deserve the highest priority. You need a repeatable process that you can use to filter requests to automate tests. Find out how to assess effort, impact, likelihood of success to select the right projects for automating. Learn to use risk management techniques to refine the process, and begin assigning criteria and ranking every suggested automation project. With this process in place, you’ll choose the right project to do now and the right one to do next.
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Lance Griter, McKesson Corporation
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From Zero to Production It is a daunting task to create a test organization from scratch. You have to obtain buy-in from key stakeholders, recruit the test team, develop their skills, build trust with the project members, and show the value of testing. George Toney shares his challenges and successes as he went through this difficult but rewarding experience at LexisNexis Group. From a mission statement at the beginning to post-implementation follow-up, discover how to build your new test team or improve the one you have.
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George Toney, LexisNexis
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