New skills you may wish to learn as a tester

Here I am with a new post!

I just thought that many of the testers may wish to learn few technical skills along with the lots of coordination! management! processes etc like me.

Here is a simple tool which can run on windows and still you can practice all your unix commands on this:

http://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/en/download/93.html

If you wish to learn few shell scripts:
here good links you can catch up.

http://www.linuxcommand.org/wss0030.php

http://www.freeos.com/guides/lsst/ch02sec01.html

If you would like to do some part time/practice register with:
https://my.utest.com/platform/index.jsp?rt=110#

And I wish to create a small community to share my views and thoughts:

http://groups.google.com/group/XpertiseTesting

If you are thinking about challenges a tester face in today's highly innovative world then here you go..

Don't be worried about them... just refer previous best videos blog. I have some exposure in testing of following domains of E-learning, E-commerce and CRM.

I have tested some of the popular LMS applications like Saba, A Tutor, Moodle etc.. and , E-commerce and CRM applications. Here are my few challenges:

- Too much is expected from a tester.. to know the complete applications/functional knowledge/expertise etc..
-  Always late hand off which results in..
- Squeeze Squeeze and Squeeze the testing durations!!
- No Process
- New technologies old methods to test
- No training
- No Knowledge transfers encouraged..

and last but not least .. testing is loosing its feet and importance unless an issue reported by a user! Big Chaos. Why this passed from testing?? Reasons????

Good YouTube Videos on Software Testing

I was browsing through some of the videos on software testing and I found most of them miss guide you. There is no substance to apart from the variety of the accents some try to do it in US Accent and some one with their nasty local accent.

Well if you are thinking about some good videos here my best pick for you.. check them out.


If you wish to go through an hour video on What Testing is all about then its really worth watching Mr. Joshi's presentation. It is little dry and some time boring. However, informative!



If you are done with the above video then may its time to think out of box and watch the below video from James Bach. One of the wonderful and thoughtful person in testing you wish to listen.





If you have another hour in your and wish you think whats latest in testing you can check the Agile testing process which is cool and worth watching for medium to advanced testing professionals.

Exploratory Testing

What is Exploratory Testing?

Ans:- Simultaneous Test Design and Test Execution

ET is very different from script based testing where we prepare test procedures, automate them etc.. ET is not as planned as Script based.

The core competency of the tester lies in simultaneous test design and Test Execution. Its good to note his ideas about the test.

Scripted testing has its place like in the case of a very complex project where it is required to repeat some critical functionality we need scripts for that to perform regression testing.

The issues we face here are how to track the test coverage. Let us have a basic view of how this happens and documents required in this testing.

Test methodology

1. First do basic system study and divide into functionalities/Pages.
2. Try to analyze high risk areas and prioritize this functionalities
3. Analyze approximate time for functionality
4. Analyze resources (testers) and time available (time to test the software)
5. Plan Bug Tracking and issue logging and tracking

Or

Alternatively we can ask tester to analyze the time required for them and get details from them.

Note:

Once ET is done, it is recommended to go for Scenario based testing. Plan for the scenario based testing separately using some resources to analyze and prepare the Use Cases.

Test Management

This table maintains data about the sessions. Functionalities covered in it, time taken, by whom, issues logged, and session status.

S

Session ID

References: (Any Docs)

Risks and Tasks:

Task breakdown (the TBS metrics)

Example

{

#Duration: 5 Short

#Test Design and Execution: 34

#Bug Investigation and Reporting: 65

#Session Setup: 10

}

Test Notes:

Example

{ I Clicked on all the items of the menu and all other in the page.

Checked all the alignments issues.

Checked the data displayed dynamically (User name and password)

Risks:

- Incorrect display of username and password

- Incorrect display due to Database issue }

Or

BugS

#Bug 456

Alignment of the certain text is not proper. Attached screen shots.

#Bug 1331

Alignment of the picture at different zooming levels.

Basics of Functional Testing

Functional Testing

The process of functional testing involves first identifying Test Conditions, Deriving Test Cases, Forming Test Suites and then executing Test Suites/ Test Procedures.

Once this is completed we will track the defects using Defect Tracking tool. Once the defects are fixed we will do Retesting (Executing the defects which failed and fixed) and Regression testing (Test cases which are likely to get impacted and high risk functionality test cases to check if there are any side effects).

The Different Functional System Testing Techniques are –

1. Requirements Testing (Business Process / Use Case Based)

2. GUI Validation and Testing (Field Validation, Spelling, Consistency…)

3. Regression Testing ( High Priority Test Cases/Impacted Test Cases)

4. Error – Handling Testing (Is it handling Exceptions and issues and providing meaningful messages)

5. Usability Testing (Navigation, Learnability, Easiness )

6. Compatibility Testing (Different browsers)

7. Manual – support Testing (Optional)

8. Intersystem Testing (Optional)

9. Control Testing (Optional)

10. Parallel Testing (Optional)……………..

Depending on the type of the project risks we add and delete all this tests. There are no rules that we should do all this tests.

A client needs a website with a very min budget and we can’t afford this much manpower being a company. So, this tests are tailored for the purpose and need.

A small project let us say a website which provides details about a organization and is a small client. We need to perform Requirements testing, GUI testing, and Error handling.

A mid size project where the users are more and involves money transaction or amount donations. Here we need to use the Use cases which show the business processes.

We need to perform Requirements testing, GUI testing, and Error handling and bit of performance testing check how time it is taking to load a page etc…

A good project will have all the rules, documentation, and many type of tests. For this kind of projects need to start the testing process very early. Better to start once the Requirements are streamlined (Subjected to project type like Phase release in which case requirements for that particular phase)

These projects require Reviews, Inspections, Many kinds of testing, Regression suite of critical functionality etc…

Specific Field Tests

Tester's Screen Validation Checklist

2.8. Specific Field Tests
2.8.1. Date Field Checks
2.8.2. Numeric Fields
2.8.3. Alpha Field Checks

Specific Field Tests

Date Field Checks

Assure that leap years are validated correctly & do not

cause errors/miscalculations

Assure that month code 00 and 13 are validated correctly & do not

cause errors/miscalculations

Assure that 00 and 13 are reported as errors

Assure that day values 00 and 32 are validated correctly & do not cause errors/miscalculations

Assure that Feb. 28, 29, 30 are validated correctly & do not cause errors/ miscalculations

Assure that Feb. 30 is reported as an error

Assure that century change is validated correctly & does not cause errors/ miscalculations

Assure that out of cycle dates are validated correctly & do not cause errors/miscalculations

Numeric Fields

Assure that lowest and highest values are handled correctly

Assure that invalid values are logged and reported

Assure that valid values are handles by the correct procedure

Assure that numeric fields with a blank in position 1 are processed or reported as an error

Assure that fields with a blank in the last position are processed or reported as an error an error

Assure that both + and - values are correctly processed

Assure that division by zero does not occur

Include value zero in all calculations

Include at least one in-range value

Include maximum and minimum range values

Include out of range values above the maximum and below the minimum

Assure that upper and lower values in ranges are handled correctly

Alpha Field Checks

Use blank and non-blank data

Include lowest and highest values

Include invalid characters & symbols

Include valid characters

Include data items with first position blank

Include data items with last position blank

Web usability evaluation/Testing

U should check basic things such as:

Layout- Does your site look credible to your end users?

Site Navigation and Architecture -How the information is organized on your site including site categories, sub categories, titles, subtitles and labeling in relation to your end users

Information retrieval- Are your end users able to find information that they want with ease?

Site Loading speeds - Evaluation of page download time to find out it your users are waiting too long for pages to appear