mr toad's wild ride

Preparation for a new job

09:51 AM, April 12, 2010 .. 0 comments .. Link

So I start at a new company as of early June 2010. So much to think about.

Testing Tools

05:10 PM, November 1, 2006 .. 0 comments .. Link

Extended Testplan- A test plan management system that uses Access or SQL Server databases (License is 89 euros)

TKOutline - A free outline processor that is useful for making lists or breaking down processes

Winmerge - Free file/folder comparison tool

My list isn't as impressive as Mr Strazzere's list but it is more relevant for me

phil started me on a screed... thanks mate.

01:06 PM, May 21, 2006 .. 1 comments .. Link

have been busy. still trying to work out how best to test based on my shop's development methodology. the last build was pretty messy, but much of the mess was punctuation or word choice in error messages related which should have been bloody easy for me to pick up on, so i gotta refocus on that. i've also been testing against the specs a bit too much and not using my head and thinking about how i think the system should work so i am going to try to get involved in discussions between the BAs and the clients when they are specing up solutions. often the system does what the spec says but that isn't exactly what the client wanted. but it is hard to criticise the BAs for leaving some ambiguity in there... [nb: i too am a BA] sometimes the developers need to think about what's normal in the system eg normal use of error messages even when it isn't in the spec...

i've got a bit slack in terms of deliverables. noone is ever going to look at them one them have been done, and i rarely get time to do regression testing, and the french belgian gets narky when i even mention regression testing, but what i want to do is to re-test all the features to make sure that bug fixes don't cause any other problems... either that or i need to retest an entire feature after a bug fix.... maybe that is a good way to go... i might think about that.

one avenue i might persue is going on different ET missions. I can look at one feature with different eyes on each pass.

look for interface problems
test implementation against the specification
test implementation against my expectations of the system which are hopefully similar to that of the clients

I think I will add that to my test documentation. right now...

my delicious account

01:33 AM, April 15, 2006 .. 0 comments .. Link

my delicious account can be found here.
testing links ahoy-hoy! i'll show you mine if you show me yours.

articles and effective software testing

07:40 PM, April 14, 2006 .. 2 comments .. Link

as i assume that people who read blogs relating to testing are also going to be into testing and pushing themselves i feel these are appropriate.

pushing your skill set

simple ways to make yourself far cleverer

get into it people.

well, i finally finished reading effective software testing and as i expected it is good. i found when i was reading that sometimes i wanted more meat, but it obviously wasn't written as that kind of book, more as a guide to improve your testing and so i will use it as such. i need to go back a re-read the sections i noted for such action, but i am glad i put the time in, and am even more glad i decided to try speed reading. i have software testing foundations, the study guide for ISTQB, here with me now and i am going to go get into it. then fish for dinner. got to boost that brain power. maybe i won't open that bottle of white tonight either. nah. baby steps...

speed reading - not testing related by damn useful...

05:45 PM, April 13, 2006 .. 2 comments .. Link

Don't know if people will find this useful, but my reading has got very slow over the years.

Article 1

Article 2

It worked for me. 80 pages of effective software testing by ms dustin has me happy with the result. go speed reading.

happy easter all.

it's a half past beer.

someone might be able to use it...

09:18 AM, April 10, 2006 .. 0 comments .. Link

i guess this is borrowed from vb for testers my mary romero sweeney so

Private Const LOGFILE = "c:\CW\VB\fResults.txt" 'change this to your logfile storage folder
Dim fs As FileSystemObject
Dim tLog As TextStream
Private Const Appname = "Test Log" 'change this to your appname

Sub LogToFile(strLogText As String)
    Static lLogNum As Long

    'create FSO
    Set fs = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")

    'increment log number counter
    lLogNum = lLogNum + 1
    'if firstline then create text file & write starting tests line
    If (lLogNum = 1) Then
        Set tLog = fs.CreateTextFile(LOGFILE, True)
        tLog.WriteLine ("Starting Tests on " & Appname & " " & Now)
    Else
        Set tLog = fs.OpenTextFile(LOGFILE, ForAppending)
    End If

    'write data to file
    Dim strTemp As String
    strTemp = lLogNum & "," & strLogText & "," & Now
    tLog.WriteLine (strTemp)

    tLog.Close

    'print to debug window
    Debug.Print strTemp

End Sub

then call it with
    LogToFile "I just logged this"

it is monday morning and my PM just got in so I should do some work. hope this is useful for someone... or if it could be improved then any tips would be appreciated.

cheers

chris

thought process to get from happy path to useful testing

08:33 PM, April 7, 2006 .. 2 comments .. Link

maybe i haven't dug deep enough but i found that the books i have read don't seem to get into the whole process of testing in the way that i want. i need case studies, i need examples, i need to see the way that expert testers approach a similar problem, and how they think about requirements, what cases and scenarios to look at and much more. so anyone with links or books to buy let me know hey...

if i only did the tests that the devs are worried about i'd be happy path testing it all over the shop. happy days indeed! i find happy path testing is good for opening up questions and forming ideas about where problems might be lurking. plus it also helps clear the simple bugs, but i might go blog about that...

steps i use to test

read the requirements and mark TC on the spots that might require a test case, use a highlighter to mark processes, changes and anything else relevant. [pseudocode style]
open an excel spreadsheet and type in the various test cases i marked earlier.
open the software and run through the new feature.
add anything extra to the spreadsheet that springs to mind.
look at the first item on the list.
write a test case.
run through the test case and in exploratory testing style add anything extra to the test case that crops up.
if a bug exists then create a problem report/log the defect in the tracking system. problem reports get fixed straight away. defects get logged for future assessment by the client. defects are for things that might be nice to do in the future if we have time but do not affect the business process/ability of the system to do the job.
go to the next item on the list and go back to step 6.
loop through until all item have been looked at. at any time if an additional test appears useful then persue that line of testing.

to simplify the process

AnalyseRequirement
WriteCaseNames

do while (Count(CaseNames)<>0)
    WriteTestCase
    RunTestCase
    AnalyseTestCase
    AmendTestCase
    if(BugExists = TRUE) then
          if(Bug=ImmediateProblem) then
                ReportProblem
          Else
                LogDefect
          end if
    end if

next CaseName

sorry. this got a little messy. my girlfriend is hungry so she is rushing me to go out for food. hope this makes some sense, and if you have anything to add regarding your own process i would be damn keen to read about it.

i go to sacrifice a maiden to the testing gods. may all your cases find bugs.

new book

09:38 AM, April 5, 2006 .. 4 comments .. Link

please don't take this as some kind of racist slur but the german amazon site is waaaaaay faster for orders than the american one. i ordered stuff off both sites around the same time and the german one got here yesterday. the american order shipped before the german one but no sign of that yet. yay for german efficiency! anyway so i now have software testing foundations by spillner, linz and schaefer in my hot little hands. looks good. foreword by rex black, one of the authors used to be CEO of ISTQB, which means that it is written for the test, partly why i got it, and also from the introduction it should be a good foundation for newbie testers. the only thing negative i have noticed thus far is a few english grammar errors. i am a tester. i used to be an english as a second language teacher. i am going to pick up on that real quick. but i will survive. i will review it once i have got through it.

i guess it was bound to happen

09:33 PM, March 30, 2006 .. 4 comments .. Link

well, the build is being tested and we had four "bugs" get reported by the clients today. i think two of them were essentially changes to the functional specifications so i guess that doesn't really count. but the fact that they found an actually "showstopper" as the guy who found the major bug put it kind of floored me. but it was bound to happen sometime. full coverage is not possible. also the bughunter was the main developer on the project for three years, i have only been on it for two months so i am not too crushed. that feature was actually part of build 1.087 which never went into production, so he only found it when they got build 1.088 for testing.

because of that, and elfriede dustin, i am going to do some research into planguage as the concept sounds very interesting. it was written up by tom gilb in order to define a clear language to be used in specs. i would love to be able to remove ambiguity from the specs, and as i am writing specs as well as testing i can actually do that quite easily. i have just opened the planguage glossary. 602 pages!!! that will have to be logged into my GTD system tomorrow.

back to effective software testing.

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