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!