Owner: Quality Frog - Questioning Software URL:http://www.questioningsoftware.com Join Date: Sat, 26 May 2007 14:43:36 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: Questioning Software. Ben Simo's software quality and testing blog. Topics include: heuristics, test automation, exploratory testing, model-based testing, test education, and more. Site statistics:Click here
Don't forget to think 2007-05-21 21:30:00 This past week at STAR East, James Bach presented a number of questions, magic tricks, games, and riddles to testers that volunteered to be tested. I feel like I did fairly well on some of them and failed miserably on others. James uses these tests to teach testers to think
. I thought I had learned some valuable lessons until I was presented with two riddles from children today. If only I could learn to think more like a child. :) I think that I sometimes let my search for hidden meanings keep me from seeing the obvious.A riddle from my children:You are blindfolded, placed at the start of a maze, and told to get to the other end. How do you navigate the maze?You can feel your way through.or a better answer isTake off the blindfold.It can be easy to blindly feel our way through though a challenge -- one obstacle at a time. At times it can be good to isolate problems but problems taken out of their context can be misleading. We need to look at problems in the context of their en
STAR East 2007 Conferred 2007-05-19 15:01:00 I am sitting in the airport waiting to fly home from STAR-East. The conference was great. It was not great due to the many wonderful presentations. It was great because of what happened outside the scheduled activities. I got to confer with colleagues from around the world.The best part of conferences such as STAR-East is the opportunity to confer with peers and thought leaders in our industry. It is an opportunity to discover that we are experiencing common problems and share possible solutions. It is an opportunity to learn from the best. I often learn more over dinner and in the hallways than I learn in the presentations.I was amazed at how quickly the conference attendees disappeared once the scheduled activities were completed. I know that many of us computer geeks are introverts. We may not be the most social bunch of people, but I believe a conference without conferring is a wasted opportunity. See y'all at CAST.Ben Simo
http://QualityFrog.com
Model-Based Test Engine Benefit #1: Simplified automation creation and maintenance 2007-05-19 10:17:00 Model-Oriented DesignProcedural automated test scripts may be easy to record or script. However, they are difficult to maintain when applications change. They are also difficult to adapt to new test ideas. Maintenance is simplified by automating the procedure generation in addition to the execution. New actions, validations, and data can be added to existing tests. This allows testers to spend more time thinking up new test ideas instead of maintaining procedural scripts.Simplified GUI Interaction CodingMost GUI automation tools contain complex vocabularies for controlling objects and retrieving information from those objects. There are usually different methods for interacting with different classes of objects. This requires that toolsmiths learn a class-sensitive vocabulary and be aware of the class as they code tests. There is an easier way: create functions that automatically detect an object's class and apply the appropriate method. This allows for the same command to be Read more:Engine
Faking It 2007-05-16 22:36:00 Pradeep Soundararajan recently posted a podcast about fake experience on resumes. [listen] This reminded me of an experience I had with a fake resume.A colleague came to me, dropped a resume in my hand, and asked if I had worked for a company listed on the resume. I quickly scanned the resume and noticed a former employer listed in the experience. I checked the dates and discovered that they included a period that I worked for that company. I then read details that listed projects in which I had been intimately involved. However, I did not recognize the name at the top of the resume. I then called several people at that company and could not find anyone that knew this person.The experience listed on the resume was fake. It was a lie.Lying on your resume can come back to haunt you -- sometimes even many years down the road. Don't fall into that trap. - Sunder RamchandranResumes: Fake it and you break itThis blatant lie was easily caught. Even if I had not worked for the company
Automating outside the box 2007-05-16 00:36:00 testany standardized procedure for measuring sensitivity or memory or intelligence or aptitude or personality etc • the test was standardized on a large sample of studentsthe act of testing something the act of undergoing testing • he survived the great test of battle trying something to find out about itautomationthe act of implementing the control of equipment with advanced technology; usually involving electronic hardware • automation replaces human workers by machines the condition of being automatically operated or controlled • automation increases productivityequipment used to achieve automatic control or operation • this factory floor is a showcase for automation and robotic equipment What is test automation?I just read some marketing literature from some leading test automation tool vendors. According to one of the vendors, their tool supports the following: Novice testers can create robust and easily maintainable tests that mimic real-life use of an applica Read more:Automating
Distracted by the machinery 2007-05-09 07:24:00 Let's not allow the machinery
of testing to distract us from the craft of testing.Over ten years, ago James Bach published his first version of Test Automation Snake Oil.In this article, James identified eight "reckless assumptions" of the classic arguments for test automation. If we aren't careful, it can be easy to start believing statements based on these assumptions.Testing is a "sequence of actions."Testing means repeating the same actions over and over.We can automate testing actions.An automated test is faster, because it needs no human intervention.Automation reduces human error. We can quantify the costs and benefits of manual vs. automated testing.Automation will lead to "significant labor cost savings."Automation will not harm the test project.Have you made any of these assumptions? Read the article for details. Then take a look at Sam Burgiss' great review.Ben Simo
http://QualityFrog.com
I'll be at STAR East in Orlando next week 2007-05-09 07:22:00 I'll be at STAR East next week I'll be in Orlando
from mid-day Tuesday through Saturday evening. Last I heard, there's still time to register.I will be a track speaker Thursday morning. My session is titled "Build a Model-Based Testing Framework for Dynamic Test Automation". Come learn how test automation can go beyond retracing paths already traced by manual testing. Learn how to send your automation out to explore an application and bring back useful information. Learn to model behavior instead of script test cases.Come find me sometime after the presentation to talk about details that won't fit in a 50-minute presentation.If you'd like to talk testing, send me an email. (If you don't get a response, my SPAM filter may be getting in the way. Try the blog comment feature.)I am looking forward to talking testing with great minds. I have found that I often learn as much -- or more -- during discussions over lunch and dinner at conferences than I learn during the scheduled conferen
Coffee Break Machine Testing 2007-05-05 13:45:00 It's good to have some idea as to what something does before you start testing it -- or eating it.Cookie Monster does a little testing in a 1967 IBM training film.Thanks to UtterlyGeek.What do you call this kind of testing?Ben Simo
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Hey Dad, when I grow up, I also want to be square. 2007-05-02 20:16:00 Erkan Yilmaz, a fellow tester blogger from Germany, recently pointed out that the slogans in my post "Slogans are models" may not transmit their message across languages and cultures. He attempted to guess at what some of the slogans meant without the context of American culture and advertising. These slogans that most Americans will instantly understand didn't work very well out of their context.We both saw this as an example of how recipients of information do not always have the full context in which the information originated. As testers, we need to admit when we don't understand and seek the answers (and context) from those that know. Sometimes we may need to bring subject matter experts into the conversation to fully understand what we are testing. If you don't know, ask questions. If you think you know, ask questions. You are bound to learn something.I recently sat in some presentations by people from the "business" (as in not IT) side of some projects in which I am involved.
Performance Testing Lessons Learned 2007-04-16 18:10:00 Web and client/server load testing can easily become a complex task. Most people I've met got started in load testing with only minimal training in using the test tools. This is how I got started in load testing -- although I had an advantage in that I had been exposed to load testing of communications systems. I also had experience with automated single-user performance testing. I had led some small-scale manual load tests with multiple testers on a conference call hitting the same client-server application at once. (And we found some show-stopping bugs doing that manual testing.) I had watched others perform load tests. I had read numerous load test plans and reports. However, I had never directly participated in executing automated load tests... then I was asked to lead a load testing project. Through the years, I have made many mistakes designing, scripting, and executing load tests. Load testing easily becomes complex. Tool sales people sometime tell us that nearly anyone can cre Read more:Learned
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Model-Based Test Engine Benefit #3: Automatic handling of application changes and bugs 2007-06-01 20:05:00 Automated tests based on models have one important feature that scripted testing cannot: automated handling of application changes
and bugs. I do not mean that model-based automation can think and make decisions like a human tester does when they discover something unexpected. Instead, the automated selection of test steps supports working around the unexpected without special exception handling code for each situation.For example: If there are two methods for logging into an application and one breaks the test engine can try the alternate option to get to the rest of the application. If a traditional scripted automated test encounters an unexpected problem it will not be able to complete.The model-based test engine (MBTE) can be coded to not try an action after a pre-defined number of failures. The MBTE's selection algorithm can then seek out other options that have not yet been found to fail. This also results in the MBTE reattempting failed actions and exposing failures that only o Read more:Engine
Poka-Yoke 2007-06-02 11:30:00 Poka-Yoke is not a dance. Its not an event at a rodeo. Its not what my kids do to each other in the back seat of the car. Poka-Yoke is Japanese for "mistake-proofing". Poka-Yoke was developed by Japanese industrial engineer Shigeo Shingo. He realized that people cannot be expected to work like machines and consistently do everything the same way every time they do it. People make mistakes and poorly designed processes can make it easier for people to err. Poka-Yoke's goal is to make it difficult for people to make mistakes through mistake prevention and detection.PreventionApplied poka-yoke gives users warnings about incorrect behavior and directs users towards the correct behavior. Computer PS/2 keyboards and mice share the same physical connector design but the connectors are usually color-coded to indicate which device goes into which port on a computer. Some computing hardware is shipped with warning stickers on top of connectors telling users to read a manual or install
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