QA!= Testing : Mother of all testing related debates is here ....

Whatever is QA, It is not testing – Cem Kaner
Do you want any better and authentic source of opinion on this topic? May be not. It is the time to open the eyes. Let us face, Testing has grown big enough to be separated from its Big brother QA. My sole aim of writing this post to educate the mass about the misconception caused by using wrong terminologies at all places.

My versions of differences:

QA: An entity that observes the activities of software engineering (while being performed or at the end of some logical milestone) and verifies that all documented or know rules and procedures are adhered. This entity does not “Touch” the work product being produced. It watches the process.

Test: Something that gets hands dirty, works with the product, uses it, abuses it, checks all relevant documents etc. Something that is similar to the development team that produced the work product – by from an evaluation angle.


These definitions are my versions and I have attempted in my best abilities to represent the mass opinion about these terms. I could be wrong … I am ready for a debate.


Problems of using QA word for testing:

Testing can not assure quality. “Testing” only measures or attempts to measure it. Quality has to be built from the beginning not to be tested later.
Assuring Quality is everybody’s (in the team) responsibility. How only testing team can be entrusted with that job? In true sense, it is management that is the real QA.
If it is strongly believed that Testing is responsible for ensuring the quality – then others can say – it is testing teams to job to ensure quality not ours.
Sets up wrong expectations about the role of testing.


Notable posts that discuss this topic

http://www.testingreflections.com/node/view/827
http://blogs.msdn.com/micahel/archive/2004/10/27/248564.aspx
http://www.stickyminds.com/sitewide.asp?ObjectId=3543&Function=DETAILBROWSE&ObjectType=COL

Shrini

AJAX - Making web experience more interactive ..

AJAX - A technology of bringing desktop software experience to web users. In this it is possible to do the things like editing data on client browser and get an update without web server resending the updated information. Be it “Editing photos on Yahoo photo albums” or using “Google maps” - it AJAX at work. Ajax is not a technology in itself, but a term that refers to the use of a group of technologies together.

AJAX - stands for "Asynchronous Java Script with XML". Java script is a default scripting model for web pages that is used to perform most of the client end data handling, rendering and other local processing. This when combined with XML can transfer the things greatly

AJAX is often considered as a threat to Macromedia's Flash Technology. Flash is more popular technology for rendering dynamic content in the form of multimedia, video based content at Web pages.

Companies like Microsoft, AOL and Amazon are already off the block in deploying this technology to spice up their Web sites. There is an increasing trend in web designers to embrace this. Ajax applications look almost as if they reside on the user's machine, rather than across the Internet on a server.

Read here more about it --
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AJAX
http://www.adaptivepath.com/publications/essays/archives/000385.php

Happy Christmas and New Year 2006 ...

Shrini

Risk based Testing ....some points to ponder

Risk based Testing - I can see lots of eyes rolling and eye brows raising on seeing this term. Likes of Project managers and Delivery managers simply love to hate this term "Risk". My boss, Manjunath Hebbar, other day gave a this beautiful definition of risk "A risk is piece of information regarding tomorrow 's (future) problem as on today (present)" and he further said - in contrast this an issues is "problem in the hand". Well - this discussion with him was around "project management" not about testing.I am not that competent to talk about project management, so let me be happy with what I am good at - testing.


Risk based testing is all about "Test" the risks in the object that you are testing. That is simpler while saying. In reality - Risk based testing involves

1. A methodical approach for identifying risks
2. Design the tests to explore the risks - know more about identified risks - As quickly as possible
3. Precipitate the failures resulting from the risks - execute tests - As quickly as possible
4. Explore other possible (unknown in the beginning) risks - As quickly as possible
5. Repeat steps 1..4 until all risks evaporate to the reasonable degree OR you run out of time/budget.


If you claim to have mastered Risk based testing technique - check you have following -

1. A proven method of identifying the risks in the product domain - most of these proven ones have a strong theoretical or empirical back ground ( mathematical/statistical or similar). A method you can rely on.
2. Test design methodology - that is matured enough to design tests to explore and precipitate this risks
3. An exit Criteria to know when are "reasonably done with"
4. Knowledge of "Risks" associated with this Risk based ( ironical isn't?) approach to testing.


There seem to be two broad categories of Risk based testing methodologies

1. Exhaustive Risk modeling and analysis - those with involved mathematical and statistically models one the lines of those used for "Reliability Engineering"

2. Heuristic Risk based Testing - rather simplistic one. James Bach has written an excellent article on this topic. As described in the article this is one of the approaches that can be adopted ( in combination with other "formal" techniques) when you have resource and time crunch. He cautions that the whole concept of "Heuristic" could be a fallible one and more of provisional and plausible. It tends to explore the solution.

I happen to discuss this issue with others in Google group on software testing, here. There are some very interesting and thought provoking ideas from Andy Tinkham in this thread.


Read following lines carefully - before you finish reading this post and tell me what do you think …
1. Testing is more about finding important problems that threaten the value of the product - issues that bug someone who matters in the context
2. Risk is a problem that might happen - higher the probability of Risk - higher is the probability of failure.
3. Should not all testing be risk based? Why would one want to test where there is no risk? When non risk based testing would be appropriate ….

Shrini

Group Test Manager - Role Description

I happen get mail from a head hunter, asking me if I am interested in a "Group Test Manager" position in a reputed Company. When I looked at the job description, what surprised me is that - not even once the word "Testing" appeared in the profile of the job that required to manage a group of test managers. I am not sure this "profile acrobatics" is from newbie head hunter or from a HR trainee who was given the task of drafting job requirements for Group Test manager.

What is the problem here? What if the word "testing" does not appear? What is big deal if I confuse "Testing" and "Quality assurence" or "SQA" or "Production Mangement" or "Software process Facilitation"? The danger of such job posting is that it is loose-loose game. As there will be expectation miss match from both sides. It will be good if the expectations are settled down before the person starts the job. If that does not happen then - chances are that either company or the candidate will start looking for alternatives within months in the new job. Think of the cost of recruitment, training, relocation and other indirect costs that involved in bringing a person onboard - especially at such senior level. If, in the beginning, the hiring manager and HR - fail to put right effort in drafting job requirements and matching title, there would be dark clouds over the future.

Notice that in this job description - the pre-requiresites (Excellent Communication, Interpersonal, Analytical Skills) mentioned last and under "Needless to mention" category. It is unfortunate that these essential requirements for the job are taken for granted - is this the case?

====================================================
Position - Group test manager
Time line - very urgent
Experience 9 to 14 years
BRIEF PROFILE: Must have
Degree in Computer Science or related field or equivalent work experience and
Minimum of 8 years of related experience in SQA and/or Production Management required Combination of equivalent training and related work experience with experience managing technical teams.
Good software engineering process facilitation skills.
Excellent problem resolution, judgment, and decision making skills required.
Strong mentoring, team building, and counseling skills on software engineering and career issues.·
Excellent written and oral communication skills required.
Willingness to travel internationally on a regular basis (at least twice a year)
Nice to have· Overseas experience
Work experience in offshore and outsourced environment
Full SDLC experience· ITSM or Six-Sigma knowledge
Needless to mention: Excellent Communication, Interpersonal, Analytical Skills are pre-requisites.
============================================

Here is another example of vague and ambiguous job description. This is from very reputed internet MNC.

Need QA Engineers with 2-6 experience in following

- Experience in Linux, Solaris and Unix
- Experience in White box
- Experience in Seibel and QTP

================================================

May God bless - the company who requires people with above mentioned skills, Head hunter who hunts for the people, Interviewer who does the interviews and finally the poor candidate -applying for this job (like someone who enters automobile "spare parts" shop asking for medicines)

Finally, if you are somebody who is currently drafting job descriptions for your test positions - Need help in reviewing and fine tuning them. Feel free to contact me at shrinik@gmail.com for my services in this regard.

Shrini

10 Classic Reasons why Test Automation projects Fail ...

Yes, this is the title of the paper that will be talking about at STeP IN Summit 2006 International Conference on Software testing at Bangalore, INDIA.

Follow this link for the conference details

http://www.stepin.qsitglobal.com/speakers.html

Be there ....

Shrini

www.crazytestingideas.com ?

Hold on !!! this is not the name of my new website nor this is another site I want you to rush and have look at. Then, What the heck is this? Read on ....

At times, when you as tester are frustrated - as you were not able to find bugs - might have done something funky, totally out of box, or outrageously creative or totally un-imaginable and that led you to some interesting bugs? When was it that jumped out of the chair and yelled “Eureka!!!! I found a BUG - Look at this?"

Something on the lines of Shoe testing as James Bach mentions in his Rapid testing class?

One such I was trying to do was similar to Shoe testing. I was testing an application screen that lists some items where the number and status was constantly changing - something on the lines of Flight arrival and departure status in an Airport Gaint Display screen. There was button for "Refresh" I just used a pen top or a clip to stick "enter key" and so that stays pressed - before doing tha I started monitors like Filemon, Task manager at performance Tab ( CPU usage and memory) and left for lunch.

When I came back after an hour so, application had died with some weird message. Looked like a memory leak issue. No would have imagined that application would be used in this way. Through this I came to know about some interesting about the application - very unusual type of testing but some times powerful. Developer might react to this and say “No would ever do this?” “This is not a typical user scenario”. I say – "Look this weird test exposed some unknown behavior about this application which none new till today. I leave it up to you whether you want to fix it or not”

Have you come across such crazy test ideas? Do share –

How about hosting a website - http://www.crazytestingideas.com/ ? Volunteers please? OR Venture capitalist to fund this new company that sells crazy testing ideas on web :-):-)

Shrini

Vision of an expert Tester?

Have you heard any skilled tester claiming this Vision? "I can test any thing, under any conditions and under any time frame". I do. Read this another "James Gems" article. Very cleverly he supports this tough goal with qualifiers. What would you do as expert tester if asked to test a nuclear power plant in 30 minutes? How will you react to test "IBM's Deep blue Chess software" in 2 hours? James gives few hints in this article as how to handle such seemingly impossible testing goals.

BTW, thinking of it, all testers should slowly march towards developing ability of "Testing anything, anywhere, under any time frame". Yes with your own qualifiers. It is a tough goal but worth pursuing – in my opinion.

Thank you James - for setting all skilled testers to this journey towards MOON - every tester is invited.

Shrini