Certification Software Testing India

SOA Testing Simplified

2009-05-25T23:55:00.001-07:00

SOA Testing Simplified (Series-II)

By Pallavi Sharma

In the last article ‘Series-I’ we got familiar with SOA architecture, and its some components. We saw how a web service ‘wsdl’ file looks like and learnt how we decipher the complex information present in the file, so that we understand the web service better. In this series we will dig deeper into SOA architecture and try to figure out how exactly the various components of SOA architecture communicate with each other to solve the complex business need.

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Sending Mail from QTP using OutLook

2009-05-25T23:54:00.001-07:00

Sending Mail from QTP using OutLook

By Navneesh Garg
As a generic Automation requirement most of the projects look at automatic emails being sent after QTP script executes or ends in a failure. Generally, outlook is configured on the systems on whissing Outlook from QTP.

‘*******************************************************************************
‘ Function: Outlook_SendEmail
‘
‘ Sends an email using Outlook.
‘
‘ Input Parameters:
‘
‘ strTo - The email address or Outlook contact to whom the email should be sent.
‘ strSubject - The email’s subject.
‘ strBody - The email’s body (this may of course include newline characters).
‘
‘ Output Parameters:
‘
‘ None.
‘
‘ Returns:
‘
‘ Not applicable. This is a sub, not a function.
‘
Sub Outlook_SendEmail(strTo, strSubject, strBody)
‘TODO: maybe add support for CC, BCC, etc?

‘Create an Outlook object
Dim Outlook ‘As New Outlook.Application
Set Outlook = CreateObject(”Outlook.Application”)

‘Create a new message
Dim Message ‘As Outlook.MailItem
Set Message = Outlook.CreateItem(0)
With Message
‘You can display the message To debug And see state
‘.Display

.Subject = Subject
.Body = TextBody

‘Set destination email address
.Recipients.Add (strTo)

‘Set sender address If specified.
‘Const olOriginator = 0
‘If Len(aFrom) > 0 Then .Recipients.Add(aFrom).Type = olOriginator

‘Send the message
.Send
End With
End Sub

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Application Security: OWASP top 10

2009-05-25T23:53:00.000-07:00

Application Security: OWASP top 10

By: Avinash K Tiwari

The Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) is a worldwide free and open community focused on improving the security of application software. The OWASP community includes corporations, educational organizations, and individuals from around the world. This community works to create freely-available articles, methodologies, documentation, tools, and technologies. Purpose of OWASP is working for finding and fighting the causes of insecure software.

Official web site: www.owasp.org

OWASP’s most successful projects include the book-length OWASP Guide and the widely adopted OWASP Top 10 awareness document.

In this post, I am going to focus on “What OWASP Top Ten” is all about.

The Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) Top Ten Project provides a minimum standard for web application security. It lists the top ten most critical web application security vulnerabilities, representing a broad concensus. Project members include a variety of security experts from around the world who have shared their expertise to produce this list. You should consider adopting security standards and begin assessing that your web applications do not contain these security flaws. Addressing the OWASP Top Ten is an effective first step towards changing your software development culture into one that produces secure code for your web applications.

Following are the OWASP top 10 vulnerabilities with a brief description

Cross-site scripting (XSS) flaws:
Hackers can impersonate legitimate users, and control their accounts.
Impact : Identity Theft, Sensitive Information Leakage, …

Injection flaws:
Hackers can access backend database information, alter it or steal it.
Impact: Attacker can manipulate queries to the DB / LDAP / Other system

Malicious File Execution
Execute shell commands on server, up to full control
Impact: Site modified to transfer all interactions to the hacker.

Broken authentication and session management:
Session tokens not guarded or invalidated properly
Impact : Hacker can “force” session token on victim; session tokens can be stolen after logout

Cross-Site Request Forgery
Attacker can invoke “blind” actions on web applications, impersonating as a trusted user
Impact : Blind requests to bank account transfer money to hacker

Information Leakage and Improper Error Handling
Attackers can gain detailed system information
Malicious system inFORMATION may assist in developing further attacks

Insecure storage
Weak encryption techniques may lead to broken encryption
Impact: Confidential information (SSN, Credit Cards) can be decrypted by malicious users

Insecure Communication:
Sensitive info sent unencrypted over insecure channel
Impact: Unencrypted credentials “sniffed” and used by hacker to impersonate user

Failure to Restrict URL Access
Hacker can forcefully browse and access a page past the login page
Impact : Hacker can access unauthorized resources

Insecure Direct Object Reference
Web application returns contents of sensitive file (instead of harmless one)
Impact: Attacker can access sensitive files and resources

We will be discussing each one the vulnaribilities in detail in the coming posts.

Moreover, more information about the following critical web application security vulnerabilities is on the OWASP website: http://www.owasp.org/index.php/OWASP_Top_Ten_Project

(Copyrighted by CresTech Software Systems Pvt. Ltd.)

Your Testing Partner

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Sample code to click on dynamic link using Browser DOM

2009-05-25T23:52:00.000-07:00

Sample code to click on dynamic link using Browser DOM

By Navneesh Garg

Let us try to understand a practical scenario. You have webpage. On this web-page the total number of links changes dynamically. Also the links on this webpage are not static links and are created dynamically based on inputs on the previous page. User needs to click on a link with a particular title on this page.

There can be multiple solutions to this problem. Please find below the solution which uses Document Object Model of Browser to browse through the links and click on the specified link.

Solution:

1. User uses DOM of Browser to get reference to the webpage
2. User get reference to collection of links on the webpage
3. Use for Loop to get to each link and based on the required property match click on the required link

Sample Code

************************************************************************

Function (Expected_Title)

Set obj = Browser(”Simple Validation”).Page(”Simple Validation”).Object.body.document
set Linkcollections= obj.Links

msgbox “No. of Links is” & Linkcollections.Length
dim counter
counter=0
For each Element in Linkcollections

StrTitle = Element.GetROProperty (“title”)
If StrTitle = Expected_Title then
Element.Click
Exit For
Else
Counter = Counter + 1
End If

Next

End Function
************************************************************************

Another Possible solution could be to use Description Object to get reference to all objects in the page.

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’A Beginner’s Blog to Performance testing’ continued

2009-05-25T23:50:00.000-07:00

HTTP (’A Beginner’s Blog to Performance testing’ continued…..)

By Happy Himanshu Gupta

As I read more on Performance testing, I thought of going on a practical application to test my college website. The search results on Google presented the name of an open-source performance testing tool named OpenSTA. It was not difficult to get familiar with the interface of the tool and I began with what is called as script recording of the application.

After the recording was complete, I opened the script to see how it actually looks like. You know guys, something more horrible than any general software code appeared on the screen, and I had never read such kind of a text before in any of my course books. It was then I realized that something more important needs to be learned, before I play around with performance measuring tools. The concept I missed out reading was HTTP, the global language of web.

Most of us open our mailbox daily and go through a number of other websites. But do we ever think, what helps us in accessing our mails and the unlimited information around the globe. Well, I never thought of it, before this question actually struck me a few days ago. Is my dumb machine intelligent enough to obey my orders every time I ask it to do so? Well friends lets now understand the way the computer listens to our request and returns back the response.

HTTP which stands for “Hypertext Transfer Protocol” is a common language which lays the path of communication for all the web clients, servers and the related web applications. HTTP Clients and HTTP Servers together make the basic component of the World Wide Web (www).

The browser that we use every day is the one that plays the role of a web client. When we wish to access a page, say, www.google.com, the browser sends an HTTP request to the server (web server) www.google.com sitting at the backend. On accepting the request, the server, makes a search for the desired object/page. On a successful search it returns back the object to the waiting browser in the form of an HTTP response.

The content that transfers over the web is composed of various Resources. The web content can be as simple as a static file. These files are composed of images, html content, video contents, movies, word files etc. The web content also has the dynamic resources which are generated on demand.

Now, the question that comes to my mind is how to locate these resources on the World Wide Web. The Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is the most common form for resource identification on www. The descriptive format of the URLs, tell us the way to fetch a resource from some particular location on the server.

Now let’s take a look at the concepts of HTTP request and response messages. The messages which are sent from web clients to web servers are called request messages. The response which the web client receives from the server is called response message. The structure of response and request messages is almost similar. HTTP messages are composed of three parts primarily: Start Line, Header Fields and Body.

Start Line:
All HTTP messages begin with a Start Line. The Start line for the request messages contains information which asks the server to do something to the resource. It contains a method which describes the function that the server needs to perform on the resource described by the URL. Similarly in a response message, the start line conveys back the status information and any resulting data to the client, thus completing the operation.

Header Fields:
HTTP headers just add more info to the request and response messages, appending after the start line. They are basically the name-value pairs that give additional info about the message being transferred. A simple HTTP header has the following syntax: a name, followed by a colon (:), followed with whitespace (optional), followed by the field value, followed by a CRLF.

Body:
The HTTP messages were actually designed to transfer this part of the message, which carry varied kinds of digital data. Images, videos, html documents, software applications, e-business applications, e-mail applications and so on, all form a part of the arbitrary binary data contained in the HTTP body. Of course, the body can also contain text.

Friends, I would recommend you all to read more on HTTP, and explore the terms better. I personally find it interesting and a rich source to understand the areas of World Wide Web which are difficult to comprehend. HTTP also forms the core for performance testing of any web application.

I will continue with a few left over headings covered under HTTP, in my next blog. Till then, happy reading… :)

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Testing Challenges & Siebel Test Automation Tool

2009-05-25T23:48:00.000-07:00

Siebel: Testing Challenges & Siebel Test Automation Tool

By Pratham Kailash

Customer relationship management (CRM) is a term applied to processes implemented by a company to handle their contact with their customers. CRM software is used to support these processes, storing information on customers and prospective customers. Information in the system can be accessed and entered by employees in different departments, such as sales, marketing, customer service, training, professional development, performance management, human resource development, and compensation. Details on any customer contacts can also be stored in the system. The rationale behind this approach is to improve services provided directly to customers and to use the information in the system for targeted marketing and sales purposes.
Oracle’s Siebel CRM product suite of applications is market leader in CRM software domain, which enables organizations to transform the customer experience. With solutions tailored to more than 20 industries, Siebel CRM delivers:
• Comprehensive CRM capabilities
• Tailored industry solutions
• Role-based customer intelligence and pre-built integration
It helps organizations in successfully managing their important needs like:
• Sales
• Marketing
• Contact Center Infrastructure and Service
• Customer Data Integration
• Quote, Order and Billing
• Partner Relationship Management
• Business Intelligence Applications
• Price Management
Oracle’s Siebel CRM technology provides the server framework to support Siebel applications. It delivers solutions for:
• Development
• Deployment
• Diagnostic
• Integration
• Productivity
• Mobile services
Quality Assurance challenges and testing tool for Siebel CRM applications
Any organization that relies on CRM application(s) to serve the needs of internal clients or customers recognizes that application quality is a prerequisite for success, not an option. A crucial ingredient for this success is an efficient, disciplined testing process to verify that applications have achieved a level of fitness that either meets or exceeds project expectations. Slipping schedules, frequently changing application user interfaces, and recurrent feature regression introduce variables that ad-hoc testing practices are unable to handle.
IBM Rational Functional Tester Extension for Siebel Test Automation is one of the tools built to address these issues. Rational Functional Tester Extension for Siebel Test Automation records user interactions with Siebel 7.7 applications, creating a test script that - when executed - reproduces those actions. During recording, the user can insert verification points that extract specified data or properties from the application under test. During playback, these verification points are used to compare recorded information with live information to ensure consistency. Following any test recording activity, testers have the option of adding custom code to the test script to perform an unlimited array of tasks, including the data manipulation and environment configuration activities that are often necessary to ensure the test lab is properly constituted for the test run. Following test execution, Rational Functional Tester Extension for Siebel Test Automation generates a report listing the results of the verification point comparisons. With Rational Functional Tester Extension for Siebel Test Automation, teams are able to more reliably and efficiently expose problems in Siebel 7.7 applications, increasing the opportunity for defect capture and repair before product deployment.
Features and benefits of IBM Rational Functional Tester Extension for Siebel Test Automation:
• Supports Siebel controls for GUI automated testing
Siebel 7.7 delivers a rich UI comprised of standard and complex controls. Rational Functional Tester Extension for Siebel integrates with Siebel Test Automation interfaces to provide robust automation support for this rich environment. By supporting standard web controls in addition to Siebel Standard-Interactivity and High-Interactivity controls Functional Tester Extension for Siebel generates scripts consisting of advanced UI control recognition and readability.

• Support for testing of Java, Web and Visual Studio .NET WinForm-based applications
Test teams are often required to assess applications built upon more than one technology base. IBM Rational Functional Tester provides equally robust automation support for applications constructed using Java, HTML/DHTML and Visual Studio .NET WinForm technologies.

• Choice of language - Java or Visual Basic .NET - for test script customization
Test script customization is mandatory in order to perform anything but the most basic tests Functional Tester for Siebel gives you a choice of powerful, mainstream scripting languages to make this possible. Choose between either Java or Visual Basic .NET - both options can be used with all the supported user interface technologies. By working with Functional Tester for Siebel, testers quickly learn to work with basic language constructs and acquire programming skills that facilitate more productive communication with developers.

• Native Java and Visual Basic .NET editor and debugger for advanced testers
Test script editing is important, but it can be difficult without a good editor and debugger. Functional Tester for Siebel delivers industrial-strength options to address this concern. Testers using Java can work in the Eclipse Java Development Toolkit (JDT), and those using Visual Basic .NET can work in Visual Studio .NET. Both integrated development environments offer a host of options to simplify test enhancement, including a helpful code-complete feature that suggests code to accelerate editing. GUI developers will find this feature particularly useful, as they can access it within the IDE they use to build the user interface.

• ScriptAssure technology to accommodate frequent UI modifications
Frequent changes to an application’s user interface can break tests, which embody assumptions about how to identify the interface’s objects during playback. Functional Tester for Siebel introduces an advanced ScriptAssure™ technology to accommodate these changes and avoid increases in maintenance overhead. ScriptAssure uses configurable algorithms to locate objects during test execution, even if the objects have changed since test creation.

• Automated data correlation and data-driven testing eliminate need for manual coding
Functional tests typically need to vary data during playback to properly simulate true users. Functional Tester for Siebel can automatically detect data entered during test recording and prepare the test for data-driven testing. Using a spreadsheet-like data editor, you can then create customized data sets to be inserted into the script during playback. In this way, you can produce highly personalized tests without manual coding.

• Multiple verification points with regular expression pattern matching support
Verification points help to ensure there is no regression from one build of the application under test to the next. Functional Tester for Siebel provides a wide range of verification points to test various aspects of your application, and it includes pattern matching support for tests in which you cannot predict the exact data response.

• Advanced object map maintenance capabilities
Functional Tester for Siebel uses an object map to store information used during test execution to locate user interface objects. It also provides maintenance capabilities to update this object map automatically whenever changes are made to the application’s user interface.

• Ships with IBM Rational Manual Tester
For teams not yet prepared to automate all of their testing efforts; IBM Rational Manual Tester is included in the Functional Tester for Siebel product box. Rational Manual Tester brings control and organization to manual testing efforts, introducing a novel test step reuse technology to improve the resiliency of manual tests despite changes made to the applications under test.

• Ships with IBM Rational ClearCase LT for automated version control
Typically, more than one version of an application is deployed within an organization, and testers must therefore maintain groups of tests for each version. Without the help of automated version control, this can be extremely difficult. Functional Tester for Siebel is designed to support automated version control, which not only provides a mechanism to maintain multiple test sets, but also enables parallel development and supports geographically dispersed teams, To help teams take advantage of this support, a full version of IBM Rational ClearCase LT, an entry-level version control tool designed for small project workgroups, is included in the product box. Rational Functional Tester users also have the option of upgrading to the standard version of IBM Rational ClearCase.

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Telecom Testing

2009-05-25T23:44:00.001-07:00

Telecom Testing

By Rohit Aggarwal

Testing in telecom world is as vast a subject as the domain itself. This blog talks about the readiness to become a telecom tester. The intent is to address the apprehensions and misconceptions; the actual tools and methodologies involved form the next level of discussion.

Kick-start
Do not jump to the System Under Test (SUT). Start from the bigger picture.
For instance, understand the technological domain/network, then the network nodes, then the SUT as a black box.

W5H of the System Under Test
There is a lot of food for thought. It is important to answer a few questions to be able to prepare the use cases and test details.
i. What does it do: functionality
ii. Where is it placed: network positioning
iii. Why is it needed: network architecture, business drivers
iv. Who will use it: end user – could be human being or another network node
v. When is it used: time, service, peak usage etc.
vi. How does it work: protocol, language, interfaces

Knowledge of deployment zone is a value-add. Test criteria needs to consider regional policies, infrastructure and usage patterns.

Documentation
A lot of information about the SUT is available through
? Technical specifications sheet
? Release bulletin
? User Manual
? Requirement Specifications
and other technical documents.

Types of Testing
There are multiple behavioral elements of the SUT that need to be tested.
? Functional
? Compliance
? Performance
? Load
? Soak

One of the key facets is that most of the telecom equipment is real-time.

Test Environment
Test tools can be
? Purchased: cost-driven
? Produced: time-driven
? Procured: contract-driven

Investment
? Ramp up
? Time: large amount of time needed to understand the technical specifications
? Cost: almost entire knowledge base freely available on web
? Test bed
? Time: to code test stubs
? Cost: to buy test stubs e.g., OS, compiler, network software, equipment

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A Beginner’s Blog to Performance Testing

2009-05-25T23:42:00.000-07:00

A Beginner’s Blog to Performance Testing

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A Beginner’s Blog to Performance Testing

July 29th, 2008 admin Posted in General Concepts |

By Happy Himanshu Gupta

Class 12th Board results were out and I ran to my PC to check the result. The anxiety level was rising every moment as it was taking time for the result page to open. Why is this page taking so long to open…?? Have I scored less…or perhaps I have failed in Chemistry..?? Oh god……!!!! What is going to happen… :( ?? Finally after 7 minutes and a few seconds, I rested in peace when the internet page opened and highlighted PASS on the screen. I just kicked my PC for taking the life out of me in those 7 minutes.

It’s just been a few days that I have stopped cursing my poor machine for those worst 7 minutes of my life when I came across a term called “Performance Testing”. I felt like sharing the definition of this term with you people and got up to writing this starting blog. :)

Performance testing is an emerging science in the field of Software testing. When we talk about effective development of an application that makes life easy, we cannot neglect its high performance as one of the major factors contributing to its quality. Performance testing is done to test a specific behavior of the application. But is there any specific criterion to define performance?

To define the concepts of performance of any system software or any general application (web/system), we can define a phrase “meeting of requirements with the timeliness” of the application. A well running application will always meet its requirements under the benchmark indicators. We map these benchmarks to the actual performance counters, which help us to judge, how the application is performing under the current environment.

These performance counters can broadly be categorized into two major dimensions, namely, Responsiveness and Scalability.

Response time of an application is the time required to process any instruction and return back the result. It is the waiting time, the measure of which is directly proportional to the number of concurrent users working on the application.
Throughput of the system is the number of events which an application can process within some interval of time. More the throughput better is the performance of the application.

Scalability of an application can be defined by its ability to meet the throughput and the response time objectives, even as the load on the application continue to increase with the increasing functionaries. Better performance is achieved by high scalability of the application.

Though Performance testing is done in conjunction with stress testing, but performance testing is not only stress testing. It covers the other aspects such as load testing and endurance testing along with the stress testing.

There are a number of tools, both commercial and open-source, to facilitate performance testing of any application. Commercial tools like Load Runner (LR) and Rational Performance Tester (RPT) are well equipped to support a number of different protocols for performance testing. Open-source tools such as OpenSTA, JMeter, Grinder, Webload etc. have made it easy for the small scale IT industries to test the performance of their applications without spending a substantial sum on gaining the licenses of their commercial counterparts.

Performance testing allows the user to identify the bottleneck in the application, which is the cause of the poor performance. The relational graphs and the statistical values of the performance counters help in analyzing the behavior of the application with the increasing load (number of users).

Well friends, the heavy rush on the Result website was the actual reason for the delay in the result that night and not my poor PC. I believe such websites should go for the performance testing of their applications before giving nightmares to the innocent children…. :)

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2 Responses to “A Beginner’s Blog to Performance Testing”

1.
Aaisha Ghosh Says:
July 30th, 2008 at 10:47 pm

:-) A Nice Read Himanshu. I am a functional tester and have been curious to Know how to get started in Performance Testing. Since you have already taken this first step, can u guide me in what all to read.

Is there some good training institute where i can get performance testing training
2.
Happy Himanshu Gupta Says:
August 4th, 2008 at 3:22 am

Thanks for your comments Aaisha. I will keep updating the blog adding more to this particular domain of testing , to help all the learners gain the primary knowledge of Performance Testing.

“QACampus”, is a one stop testing portal, which is maintained by the Learning and Training Devision of our organization. Just check out the ‘Contact Us’ section on this website, to reach out to us for any query. I believe QACampus is the best place to learn any aspect of testing.

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Introduction To HR Payroll »

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Introduction To HR Payroll

2009-05-25T23:39:00.000-07:00

Introduction To HR Payroll

By Anurag Vasisht

Introduction

Payroll is one business area that is of relevance to all of us. We all work to get paid (or most us, anyway). In good old days, this payment used to be a straight affair of a fixed salary OR a simple multiplication of number of hours with hourly rate. Not any more. Nowadays, it’s a much more complicated process with concepts like deductions, contributions, exemptions, taxation laws, union contracts, commissions, loans, bonus payments and other special payments/deductions. HR Payroll also provides input to downstream systems like Finance Accounting, General Ledger etc.

For the purpose of understanding the nuts and bolts of HR Payroll, let us define employees under the following broad categories. This distinction is required because the Payroll processing is vastly different for these categories. Most employers, big or small, follow this segregation at the topmost level, drilling down to different levels of complexity based on size and diversification of their businesses.

1. Non-Exempt
These employees are required to accurately record the time that they spend on work. If different types of work have different payment rates, then they are expected to record time against different “attendance/work codes”. If time is not recorded for work done, then no payments are made for that work.

Such employees are setup with an expected daily/weekly hours and basic rate of pay instead of a fixed/basic salary. If these employees work more than their schedule, then they are paid overtime at a normal or premium rate as defined.

In some cases, such employees are contracted through Labor Unions and are paid as per the terms and conditions as defined in the respective contracts.

2. Exempt
These employees are exempt from recording their time on work. Such employees are setup with a schedule (such as Mon-Fri 9-6) and are expected to report time only if some exception happens from their normal schedule (such as vacation or jury call or military duty). Unless they report an exception it is understood that they followed their schedule. Though employers do set up in/out devices for monitoring purpose and deviations are questioned, but these typically do not impact the payments unless there is a drastic variation.

Typically, management employees fall under this category while non-management employees are under Non-Exempt category.

2. Stages of Payroll processing
1. Employee setup
This is the static information which is typically set up for an employee at Hire time and updated typically at the start of a financial year. This is expected to remain the same till there is change in status of the employee, caused by events such as promotion, termination, demotion, change of job profile or location etc. Setup information includes data such as type of employee, job profile, work location, work schedule, leave entitlements, payroll cycle (weekly, semi-monthly, monthly etc), basic pay (or rate of pay), compensation and benefits, medical and insurance plans etc. This setup pretty much defines the way actual processing happens at the end of every payroll cycle.

2. Attendance/Absence Records
Non exempt employees record each hour and minute of work against relevant attendance code. This time is compared against the work schedule and determined if any premium is to be paid against overtime, holiday worked etc.

In case of absence in scheduled work hours, time is coded against the relevant absence codes. This is applicable for both exempt and non-exempt employees. Absences are compared against the leave entitlements, and determined if they need to be paid out or any deductions need to be made.

3. Calculation of Gross Pay

It is typically the summation of all earnings. For non-exempt employees, the figure arrived from number of hours X hourly rate can start as the basis while for exempt employees, the basic salary can for the basis. In this figure, various garnishments are added to arrive at the Gross Pay. These include overtime/holiday worked premiums, commissions, bonus payments, arrears from previous salaries, misc benefits etc.
4. Calculation of Net Pay

This calculated by subtracting the various deductions and taxes from the Gross Pay. Deductions may include loan payments, union dues, overpayments of previous salaries, contributions to misc health/benefit/insurance plans. Taxes are generally applied after deductions and include federal, state and local taxes. Net Pay is what an employee gets in his account.

3. Key Considerations in Testing
1. Setup & Locale: Payroll processing is different for each country, and sometimes there are major differences with in states in a country. Even though generic rules are good to have an overview, a thorough understanding of the local (financial, labor and taxation) laws is essential. Similarly, HR policies of a company that govern all the Payroll processing are important to learn and comprehend before jumping headlong into IT solution that implements those policies. Finally, knowledge of IT solution (implementation) is recommended as each vendor differs vastly from the other, and even in case of black box system testing, it does no harm to know the vital aspects.

2. Movements: Any kind of movement brings complexity to the system. Whether it was a Hire, Rehire, Termination, Transfer from one location to another, Promotion, Demotion: all of these visibly impact the payroll processing. Much of the complexity can be removed if a company prohibits movements in the mid of a pay period. Then, there is a clear demarcation, and the process can be easily developed and tested to take notice of such a movement. However, if there is no such restriction, then it is a nightmare…requiring much more analysis in understanding, implementing and testing the solution.

3. “Worked/Earned” vs. “Paid”: This concept is critical in case of reports which run out of Payroll. Consider this example: An employee works for the period 12/16/07 to 12/31/07. His Payroll processing happens on 1/3/08 and gets paid on 1/5/08. Now, assuming there is monthly report which displays employee wages. In this case, should the amount for the work done between 12/16/07 to 12/31/07 appear in Dec 07 report or Jan 08 report? There is no default answer to this question, and depends from case to case – determined by the business that uses the report. So, this question must definitely be asked for any Payroll report testing.

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IBM Rational Functional Testing

2009-05-18T00:08:00.001-07:00

IBM Rational Functional Testing

By Vaibhav Agarwal

Now a days most of us (in IT industry) know/have heard about Automated testing tools.

Rational Functional Tester (RFT), as the name says, is an automated functional testing tool from Rational. This tool tests your application automatically without human intervention.

IBM Rational Functional Tester is an object-oriented automated testing tool that lets you test a variety of applications. You can quickly generate scripts by recording tests against an application, and you can test any object in the application, including the object’s properties and data. Rational Functional Tester offers you a choice of scripting language and development environment — Java in the Eclipse framework or Microsoft Visual Basic .NET in the Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Development Environment. That means that regardless of the language or platform your development staff has chosen, you should be able to integrate with them and leverage some of their expertise as you develop your automated tests.

Rational Functional Tester offers these powerful capabilities
• Play back scripts against an updated application
• Update recognition properties for an object
• Merge multiple test object maps
• Display associated scripts
• Use pattern-based object recognition
• Integrate with UCM

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Working with Excel objects in QTP

2009-05-18T00:07:00.003-07:00

Working with Excel objects in QTP

We create framework for automating the application. For this we need the independent structure for reporting and data. Excel plays a very important role in this approach.

QTP has its own test result displaying mechanism in the predefined format. Once the test is run, the result sheet is generated which gives you the insight of the script – stating the point of failures, warnings and passes.

We create customized checkpoint in the script and it is possible to customize the result file also depending upon the checkpoint created will be passed or failed.

In most of the cases we want to create summarized or detailed report of the entire test in excels. The reason to create customized report is that one is able to keep the file in central location and to create the report in our own format.

In this article we are going to learn the interaction of Excel with VBScript.

The whole mechanism goes in the following steps:
1. Understanding the hierarchy of Excel Application.
2. Creating the Excel Object
3. Opening an existing workbook or creating the new one
4. Setting the objects for various sheets in workbook.
5. Writing and fetching the data values in the cells.
6. Saving and closing the workbook
7. Closing the application and releasing the memory

We will go through each of the above stated steps with a suitable example to understand the approach properly.

Understanding the hierarchy of Excel Application

We will not go into the details of the complete hierarchy of the Excel application but to the extend what is required.

Excel Application
Workbooks
Sheets
Cells

Creating the Excel Object

The first step towards the process of reporting via excel is to create object of Excel. Reporting in Excel can either be done in backend, without making the application visible or u can make it appear to user once the process of writing or fetching the data is going. In either way creating of the Excel Application object is required.
It goes as:
Dim xl
Set xl = CreateObject(“Excel.Application”)

Opening an existing workbook or creating the new one

Once the excel object has been created, it means that excel application has been invoked but is not visible. So either one can perform the operations like that or make the application visible and then perform the operations.

To make the application visible:
xl.visible = true

To open a new Workbook:
xl.workbooks.Add

To open an existing Workbook:
xl.workbooks.Open(“File Name with complete path”)

Setting and accessing the objects of sheets in workbook.

Once the workbook has been opened, either existing or new one, we need to write some data in various cells in various sheets of that workbook.
By default there are 3 sheets in a workbook and various operations can be performed on. So one need create the object to reference these sheets as it becomes easy to access them and you don’t have to mention the complete hierarchy over and over again.

Say one has to create a reference for sheet with index i, which starts from 1
Set sht1 = xl.activeworkbook.sheets(i)

One can add or delete n number of sheets from the activeworkbook
To add a sheet in workbook –
xl.activeworkbook.sheets.add

To delete a particular sheet where i represent the index which starts from 1 –
xl.activeworkbook.sheets(i).delete

To change the name of the sheets –
xl.activeworkbook.sheeets(i).name = “Name of your choice”

To count the total number of sheets in the workbook
Cnt = xl.activeworkbook.sheets.count

Writing and fetching the data values in the cells

To write the data in Excel sheet, one should know the cell address in which the data has to be written. Same thing goes for accessing the data from the cells

To write the data in sheet2 cell address as D8, we write the following command. Cell address here is represented by row number followed by column number –
xl.activeworkbook.sheets(2).cells(8,4) = “hello”
To fetch the data from sheet3 cell address A7 –
Val = xl.activeworkbook.sheets(3).cells(7,1)

If one has already created the object of the particular sheet, you don’t have to write the complete hierarchy but simply –
Object.cells(row,col) = value

Saving and closing the workbook

Once the work completed you can save the newly created workbook to a specified location or save the changes made to already existing opened workbook.

To save as in case of new workbook
xl.activeworkbook.saveas “path_with_file_name.xls”

To save in case of existing workbook
xl.activeworkbook.save

To close the workbook
xl.activeworkbook.close

Closing the application and releasing the memory

To close the application
xl.quit

To release the memory of all the objects
Set xl = nothing

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Rational Functional Tester- Features and benefits

2009-05-18T00:07:00.001-07:00

Rational Functional Tester- Features and benefits

1. Ensure playback resilient to application changes with ScriptAssure technology -

Frequent changes to an application’s user interface can hamper test script execution. IBM Rational Functional Tester introduces an advanced ScriptAssure™ technology to accommodate these changes and avoid increases in maintenance overhead. ScriptAssure uses fuzzy matching algorithms to locate objects during test execution, even if the objects have changed since test creation.

2. Increase script re-use with wizard for data driven test creation –

Data driven tests are functional tests that perform the same series of test actions, but with varying data. IBM Rational Functional Tester can automatically detect data entered during test recording and prepare the test for data-driven testing. Using a spreadsheet-like data editor, you can then create customized data sets to be used by the test during playback. In this way, you can achieve test script re-use without time consuming manual coding.

3. Streamline automation with keyword testing –

Rational Functional Tester provides ability to define and automate keywords which can be reused in both functional and manual tests. This promotes script reuse and enables manual testers to easily and selectively leverage the power of automation within manual test cycles.

4. Proxy SDK –

This feature allows testers to define support for custom controls.

5. Choice of test editing language - Java or Visual Basic .NET –

Test script customization is mandatory in order to perform anything but the most basic tests. IBM Rational Functional Tester gives you a choice of powerful, mainstream scripting languages to make this possible. Choose between either Java or Visual Basic .NET - both options can be used with all the supported user interface technologies. By working with Functional Tester, testers quickly learn to work with basic language constructs and acquire programming skills that facilitate more productive communication with developers.

6. Validate dynamic data with dynamic data validation wizard –
Validating dynamic data, such as time stamps or order confirmation numbers can be tedious time consuming task, involving complex manual coding. IBM Rational Functional Tester includes wizard driven support for regular expression dynamic data validation. Users can effortlessly validate dynamic data against template patterns without having to write complex code.

7. Manual Test Automation support –

For teams not yet prepared to automate all of their testing efforts, IBM Rational Manual Tester is included in the Rational Functional Tester product box. Rational Manual Tester brings control and organization to manual testing efforts, introducing automated data entry and data validation to manual.

8. Test script version control for parallel development –

Typically, more than one version of an application is deployed within an organization, and testers must therefore maintain groups of tests for each version. Without the help of automated version control, this can be extremely difficult. IBM Rational Functional Tester is designed to support automated version control, which not only provides a mechanism to maintain multiple test sets, but also enables parallel development and supports geographically dispersed teams, To help teams take advantage of this support, a full version of IBM Rational ClearCase LT, an entry-level version control tool designed for small project workgroups, is included in the product box. Rational Functional Tester users also have the option of upgrading to the standard version of IBM Rational ClearCase.

9. Native Java and Visual Basic .NET editor and debugger for advanced testers –

Test script editing is important, but it can be difficult without a good editor and debugger. IBM Rational Functional Tester delivers industrial-strength options to address this concern. Testers using Java can work in the Eclipse Java editor and those using Visual Basic .NET can work in Visual Studio .NET. Both integrated development environments offer a host of options to simplify test enhancement, including a helpful code-complete feature that suggests code to accelerate editing. GUI developers will find this feature particularly useful, as they can access it within the IDE they use to build the user interface.

10.Linux test editing and test execution support –

For cross-platform Java applications, IBM Rational Functional Tester offers scripting to create, edit, and execute tests on the Linux platform - including everything except a test recorder. It also supports the Windows platform for all recording, editing, and execution capabilities.

11.Add-on support available for testing 3270/5250 terminal-based applications –

Teams responsible for testing mixed workload environments - environments comprised of both Java/Web/Visual Studio .NET-based applications and mainframe-based applications - can purchase the IBM Rational Functional Tester Extension for Terminal-based Applications. This extension enables automation and testing for 3270 and 5250 terminal-based applications, including automated data entry and response verification, using the testing tool and scripting language the tester favors for Windows and Linux-based applications.

12.Extended automated functional and regression testing for Siebel® and SAP® applications –

IBM Rational Functional Tester Extension for Siebel Test Automation interfaces to provide robust automation support for both Siebel 7.7 and 7.8. IBM Rational Functional Tester Extension Automated test creation, execution and analysis of SAP GUI applications.

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Application Security : Unlocking the myth

2009-05-18T00:06:00.002-07:00

Application Security : Unlocking the myth

By Avinash K Tiwari

More and more companies are relying on Web-based applications to provide online services to their employees, to support e-commerce sales and to lever¬age portals, discussion boards and blogs that help staff better communicate with customers, partners and suppliers. However, as the number and complex¬ity of Web applications have grown, so have the associated security risks. With increasing frequency, incidents of Web application breaches resulting in data theft are popping up as front-page news.

Some of news you can’t ignore

World story

• 40 Million Credit Cards Compromised
• 55 Million Customer Records Exposed, 130+ Security Breaches in 2005
• $105 Billion In Cyber crime Proceeds in ’04, More than Illegal Drug Sales

There have been quite a few Govt and FSS security breaches in India recently.
• Hacker breaks into 17 bank a/cs
• Bank of India site hacked, served up 22 exploits
• Maharashtra govt website hacked
• Goa govt’s info website hacked

A fact which can’t be ignored:

Close to 80% of web sites are vulnerable to Cross-site scripting, which can be executed even by a novice hacker. Your website could be one as well.

A myth that our website is safe:

“We have Firewalls in Place”
“We Use Network Vulnerability Scanners”
“we use SSL”

What’s the real picture??

Lets take a look at the different security layers used in the protection of a web application:

In order to protect the desktop, users and organizations install antivirus protection
The communication layer is protected by encrypting the traffic, using SSL
Firewalls and IDS are used to only allow specific communication (port) access (i.e. WEB traffic)

Let’s take each layer one by one

When we talk about web traffic desktop security is not in picture

Using SSL will encrypt the web traffic and make life difficult for a hacker intercepting the traffic. But, use of SSL can’t stop a hacker from manupulating the data by directly accessing the application

Firewalls are set up to allow outsiders access to specific resources, and to prevent them from accessing other resources. For example, an outside individual wouldn’t be allowed to directly connect to a database, but they can make a request to a web server. This means the firewall would be configured to deny traffic on a standard database port 1443, but allow traffic through ports 80 and 443 - web application ports. This system is clearly no protection at all against malicious attacks aimed at the web application.

The next protection an HTTP request encounters is an intrusion detection system. The IDS has been set up to look for signatures in the traffic that might indicate an attack. For example, they may look for a SQL statement embedded within a request, or they might look for a script tag that indicates a potential XSS attack. The challenge with these systems is that if the request is encoded in some alternative format (such as Unicode Transformation Format, UTF-7) or perhaps the traffic is encrypted using SSL, the intrusion detection system is often not able to interpret or understand the requests. The IDS offers little to no protection against the web application attack.

The last system that the HTTP request might encounter before the web server is probably an application firewall. These are the smartest of all the network protections and can be configured explicitly to only allow certain traffic that it knows to be good. The problem with these systems is that it’s very expensive to maintain the correct configurations or valid algorithms and testing of these systems to recognize good traffic. If the web application firewall has been designed to fail securely (a web application security principle), that is, if you’re not sure what to do, they block the user, the web application firewall may block legitimate traffic. For this reason, most application firewalls are usually designed to break one of the founding principles of security (fail securely) by allowing through traffic that they don’t understand.

So, as you can see, even with antivirus, firewalls and IDS, you still have to allow web traffic through your firewalls, IDS and IPS. This web traffic can be friendly, or it could be malicious – but there is no way to know which one it is. Since web users can access your application over the web, they can perform all sorts of malicious activities and either steal, manipulate or destroy information.

So the bottomline is THE WEB APPLICATION MUST DEFEND ITSELF.

(Copyrighted by CresTech Software Systems Pvt. Ltd.)

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Batch Execution of QTP Scripts

2009-05-18T00:06:00.001-07:00

Batch Execution of QTP Scripts

By Navneesh Garg

The user has several scripts which test different parts of his application, and he would like to execute the tests all together in a batch mode i.e. a main script that calls other scripts. The end objective is that complete suite of scripts can be executed without any human intervention one after another.

Here are some ways to run a set of several scripts together.
1. Use the Automation Object Model (AOM)
Use the Automation Object Model (AOM) to define the tests to be run and execute them. Using AOM you can set various QuickTest Professional settings and values. The AOM is as close as command line functionality as QuickTest Professional has. Using AOM you can get reference to QTP application object and using this reference, you can call and execute all QTP testscripts which you would want to run in sequence/batch mode. Inoder to find how to use AOM, you can refer to Object Model reference guide of QTP

2. Use TestDirector for Quality Center
Use TestDirector for Quality Center (Quality Center) to schedule and run an execution flow. Quality Center will launch QuickTest Professional and run the tests for you, so you will not need to launch QuickTest Professional, run a script, and close the script, in order to launch the next script.

3. Use Resuable Actions
Make the Actions in the test scripts reusable, then insert a copy or a call to action into the main test. This will call the Action of the scripts.

4. Use the Multi-Test Manager utility.

This utility is available on Mercury Support Site, which helps in batch execution of scripts. It has some decent features like, drag and drop of scripts, scheduling script execution and automatic emailing.

5. Use the Test Batch Runner utility.

You can access it by going to Start -> Programs -> QuickTest Professional -> Tools -> Test Batcher. For more information on the Test Batch Runner, please refer to the QuickTest Professional User’s Guide (QuickTest Professional User’s Guide -> Running and Debugging Tests and Components -> Running Tests and Components -> Running a Test Batch).

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SOA Testing Simplified (Series-I)

2009-05-18T00:05:00.003-07:00

SOA Testing Simplified (Series-I)

By Pallavi Sharma

If you have reached this blog, then may be you have heard about SOA and testing SOA applications, or may be you understand testing and would like to know what SOA testing is all about or maybe you want to know what SOA and testing is all about… Well however complicated your case may be… I would explain SOA and testing SOA applications in an uncomplicated way to you in a series of blogs and this is the very first blog on it.

SOA stands for Service Oriented Architecture. It describes IT infrastructure which allows different applications to exchange data with one another as they participate in business processes. The aim is a loose coupling of services with operating systems, programming languages and other technologies which underlie applications. [1].

These services inter-operate based on a formal definition (or contract, e.g., WSDL) that is independent of the underlying platform and programming language. Services written in C# running on .NET platforms and services written in Java running on Java EE platforms, for example, can both be consumed by a common composite application (or client). Applications running on either platform can also consume services running on the other as Web services, which facilitates reuse.

Let’s understand the term ‘Web Service’. A Web Service in simplistic terms is a web enabled API, that can be accessed over the network. In the SOA architecture it is one component which takes care of a specified business need. Each web service has its own contract file which is required to communicate with it. This contract file is termed as WSDL, which is defined as, ‘Web Service Description Language’. As clear from the name, it provides information about what a web service is all about. The kinds of information you can fetch from the WSDL file are:
1. Where the web service is hosted.
2. What functionality the web service provides.
3. What all methods a web service consist of.
4. What arguments the web service takes and what response it returns.
Let’s take an example web service and its wsdl file and try to make sense out of it. The example web service is ‘MoneyConverter’; this service converts a currency value provided in Indian Rupees, to Dollars and vice versa. It solves a business requirement and will consist of two methods, you guessed them right:

a. RupeesToDollars
b. DollarsToRupees

Let’s take a look at the WSDL file for this service, which is an xml file describing this web service. [File attached]

To decipher the WSDL document, let’s begin from the end. The last xml node of the wsdl file provides information where the service is hosted.

“
A web service for converting currencies

”

Moving up, we find information about what all methods are present and what arguments they take and the return value.

wsdl:portType name=”ConverterSoap”>

Convert from Rupees to Dollars

Convert from Dollars to Rupees

Now we would like to know what does the input message looks like, and the output, for this lets move a bit up the document. The “wsdl type” xml node defines all the data types which are passed as arguments or returned as response after the method invocation. Let’s take one node and explain it further:

It states that the element is of type ‘decimal’, name of the element is ‘amount’, and it is a mandatory argument for the method, which can be understood by the minoccurs and maxoccurs attributes of the s:element node.

So, from the above information provided by the WSDL document of the MoneyConverter, we now know the following;

1. The port where the web service is hosted.
2. The methods which are present in the web service.
3. The arguments and the return value of each method of the web service.

Empowered with all this information, in the next blog series we will understand how we exactly use this web service, so that we are more enlightened to test it.
References:

1. Newcomer, Eric; Lomow, Greg (2005). Understanding SOA with Web Services. Addison Wesley. ISBN 0-321-18086-0.

(Copyrighted by CresTech Software Systems Pvt. Ltd.)

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What’s in Web 2.0

2009-05-18T00:05:00.001-07:00

What’s in Web 2.0

The rising popularity of user-driven online services, including MySpace, Wikipedia, and YouTube, has drawn attention to a group of technological developments known as Web 2.0. So, what all cosist of web2.0?
Read till end…

Blogs (short for Web logs) are online journals or diaries hosted on a Web site and often distributed to other sites or readers using RSS (see below).

Collective intelligence refers to any system that attempts to tap the expertise of a group rather than an individual to make decisions. Technologies that contribute to collective intelligence include collaborative publishing and common databases for sharing knowledge.

Mash-ups are aggregations of content from different online sources to create a new service. An example would be a program that pulls apartment listings from one site and displays them on a Google map to show where the apartments are located.

Peer-to-peer networking (sometimes called P2P) is a technique for efficiently sharing files (music, videos, or text) either over the Internet or within a closed set of users. Unlike the traditional method of storing a file on one machine—which can become a bottleneck if many people try to access it at once—P2P distributes files across many machines, often those of the users themselves. Some systems retrieve files by gathering and assembling pieces of them from many machines.

Podcasts are audio or video recordings—a multimedia form of a blog or other content. They are often distributed through an aggregator, such as iTunes.

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) allows people to subscribe to online distributions of news, blogs, podcasts, or other information.

Social networking refers to systems that allow members of a specific site to learn about other members’ skills, talents, knowledge, or preferences. Commercial examples include Facebook and LinkedIn. Some companies use these systems internally to help identify experts.

Web services are software systems that make it easier for different systems to communicate with one another automatically in order to pass information or conduct transactions. For example, a retailer and supplier might use Web services to communicate over the Internet and automatically update each other’s inventory systems.

Wikis , such as Wikipedia, are systems for collaborative publishing. They allow many authors to contribute to an online document or discussion.

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Use Case Based Testing (UCBT)

2009-05-18T00:04:00.001-07:00

Use Case Based Testing (UCBT)

Use Case Based Testing (UCBT), is a technique for generating test cases and recommended configurations for system level testing. In this approach, testers build a test model based on the standard UML notions of use cases, actors, and the relationships between these elements. The use cases are enhanced with additional information, including the inputs from actors, the outputs to the actors, and how the use case affects the state of the system. Newly developed algorithms use this model to generate a test suite which provides a specified level of coverage of each use case. We could also generate workload configurations that combine the test cases according to requirements specified in the model. The generation algorithm performs minimization to reduce the number of test cases required to cover the system to the specified level. The workload configurations are based on desired percentages associated with each actor that the tester provides. These features form a powerful basis for model-based test case generation.

What testing phase does UCBT address?
UCBT addresses phases where the tester is interested in exploring behavior that flows through multiple use cases, which are typically the late function, system, and solution phases of the test life cycle. In late function level test, the tester has tested the use cases individually, and is now interested in looking at combinations of the use cases. System test addresses the situation when all required functionality for the system is present, and the tester seeks to ensure the proper functioning of the system as a whole. An important component of system test is also ensuring that the system can handle customer-like scenarios and workloads. Solution test addresses the situation in which several complete systems are combined to provide complex functionality through some process that involves the systems. These processes can be captured, modeled, and tested using UCBT.

What does the tester do in UCBT?

To do UCBT, the tester needs to identify four things:
the use cases of interest,
the actors involved in using the system,
the input, output, and system effects for the use cases,
The flows of interest between the use cases.

A use case is a semantically meaningful function that provides some value from the user’s point of view. For example, saving a file in a word processing system would be represented by the Save File use case. Each use case can have input parameters associated with it, and for each parameter, a set of logical partitions of the values that parameter can take may be identified. Finally, the use cases can be connected using flows that describe a sequence of use case that are performed to accomplish some goal.

What is produced by UCBT Tool?
UCBT produces two types of test cases. The first types are abstract test cases, which are not executable. These are suitable for incorporation in a test plan and are provided in structured English. They show the ordering of use cases to be performed and the inputs and expected results that each use case should have during the test. The second type of test cases are in a format known as ATS, which can be used to create executable test cases using another tool known as TCBeans or any such tool . The test suite produced by UCBT is minimized in size by performing a two pass optimization based upon the input parameter interactions that the tester specifies, as well as the flows of interest. This ensures that the number of test cases is reasonable, so execution and evaluation can be done with a feasible amount of effort.

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What’s new with QTP9.5

2009-05-18T00:02:00.003-07:00

What’s new with QTP9.5

This is the general overview giving the brief description of what is new in QTP9.5

New Features:

1. New design time panes:
Various new IDE panes have been introduced which does not provide any new functionality to add up but basically the operations which were in the deep sub menus are now put up in front.

Available Keyword Pane:
This pane shows all the available functions in the current test (either in-action or externally added), as well as all the objects in your object repository (local and external). The items are effectively separated into groups, making it easier to search for a relevant item. Double clicking any item in the pane will open it, and dragging the item to the main window will add it to the script in the drop position. Double clicking a function will not only open the hosting file in the main window, but also focus on the exact position of the function within the file.

Test Flow Pane:
This pane lays out the action call structure of the current test. It outlines the order in which the “main” actions are called, as well as the inner-action calls between actions. Other than understanding the test flow, it offers a central place to access and maintain the properties of the actions. One can easily delete an action, change its properties and its action-call properties, access its object- repository, and control the order in which it will be called within a test.

Resource Pane:
This pane offers a quick overview of all the external function files, recovery scenarios and object repositories associated with the test; it also provides a quick way to add and remove these resources. One can associate repositories with specific actions, add new external library files and add new recovery scenarios.

Process Guidance Pane:
This pane (or rather – panes) somewhat resembles MS Office on-line help. These panes include a topic list on one side and a content area on the other (though you can position and dock the components as you like). Clicking a topic will load its contents onto the content area, and one can navigate via the Next and Back buttons.
One can add his own “process guidance packages”, which can offer unique topics and contents. For example, these might include the way to store tests and manage code versions, how to work with custom objects in the application, coding standards, and much more. These packages can be easily created with simple HTML pages and a contents XML file.

2. Checkpoint and Output Values Management
Checkpoint and Output Objects in the Object Repository: All your checkpoints and output values are stored as objects in the object repository so that you can manage them together with your test objects.
Enhanced functionality of Bitmap Checkpoint: Bitmap checkpoints now include options for specifying RGB tolerance (percentage) and pixel tolerance (number of pixels or percentage) values. These values enable one to indicate acceptable differences between the actual image and the one stored with the checkpoint.

3. Running Scripts in Maintenance Mode
In Maintenance Run Mode, QTP identifies discrepancies between the objects in the repository and those in application, and then offers solutions for updating objects and steps in real time. The run pauses each time an object is not found. One can point to the required object in application, and QuickTest will recommend a solution for updating the object repository and test step to match the selected object. Alternatively, one can select to add comments to a problematic step and address it manually at a later time.

4. Web Add-In Extensibility
QTP 9.5 enables one to extend the support given for Web objects by means of its Web Add-In Extensibility feature. This feature is very important especially when the AUT includes unsupported third-party or custom Web controls. Moreover new technologies such as AJAX are also supported. To use this feature, JavaScript knowledge is necessary. Implementing a Web extension requires to configure 2 XML files, write some code in JavaScript and then deploy these files to the required folders.

5. New Supported Operating Systems and Environments
QTP 9.5 has added new support for the operating systems, browsers, and development environments listed below.
• Windows Vista 64-bit Edition
• Netscape Browser 8.1.3, and 9
• Mozilla Firefox 2 and 3.0 Alpha 7
• Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5
• Oracle Forms and Oracle Applications, version 10g
• Java SWT toolkit, versions 3.2, and 3.3
• Eclipse IDE, version 3.2 and 3.3 (For Java Add-in Extensibility)
• New Terminal Emulator types and versions:
o AttachmateWRQ EXTRA! 9, Terminal Viewer (compatible EXTRA! 9), Reflection for Unix and OpenVMS sessions 14, Reflection 14
(Note: Reflection 13 is not supported.)
o Hummingbird HostExplorer 2007
(Note: HostExplorer 2006 is not supported)
o IBM IBM 5.9, IBM WebSphere Host On-Demand 10
o NetManage RUMBA 7.5, RUMBA Web-to-Host 5.3
o Seagull BlueZone 4
o Zephyr PASSPORT 2007, PASSPORT PC TO HOST / WEB TO HOST 2004 and 2007

6. Miscellaneous Improvements:
Auto-convert to relative path: Whenever you include a resource (e.g. an external library, object repository, etc.) a pop-up will appear, suggesting to add the relevant path to QTP’s folders list, and to convert that path to a relative one.
New actions are reusable: In QTP 9.5, when you create new actions, they are set as reusable by default.
Text recognition mechanism: One can now configure which text recognition mechanism(s) you want to use for recognizing text in Windows applications, and also in which order the mechanisms should be applied.
Record on SWT: When using the Java Add-in, recording on objects developed using the SWT toolkit is now supported.

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What’s new with QTP9.5

2009-05-18T00:02:00.002-07:00

Database Handling in QTP using ADODB

2009-05-18T00:02:00.001-07:00

Database Handling in QTP using ADODB

Database handling via VBScript is basically done with following steps:
1. Creating the object of ADODB
2. Define the Connection String for the database to connect
3. Opening the connection
4. Firing of the query
5. Accessing data with Record Set Object
6. Closing the connection
7. Release the memory occupied by the Objects.

We will go through each of the above stated steps with an appropriate example showing how the things work up in real life application.

Creating the object of ADODB –

Set db = CreateObject(“ADODB.Connection”)

Specifying the Connection String of the database to connect –

Connection String related to specific connection can be set either with or without DSN (Data Source Name).

In Case of DSN –
You create the DSN depending upon you want to fetch the data from SQL Server, Excel, Access etc. depending upon the drivers present in your system. Say for example DSN for Ms-Access is created with name as “MyDSN” for a pre specified database selected. You will write the command as:
Db.ConnectionString = “DSN = MyDSN”

In case you don’t want to create a DSN-
Connection String will now contain the complete information of what is contained in DSN. It has a benefit over DSN, that the connection since it can contain the complete network path of the database, so can work on all systems. But in case of DSN, that has to be present in the machine when you are using it. Again taking that database is on MS-Access -
Db.ConnectionString = “Driver={Microsoft Access Driver (*.mdb)};Dbq=C:\mydatabase.mdb;Uid=Admin;Pwd=;”

Opening the connection

Once the connection string has been set, next step goes towards the opening of the connection. It basically setup the connection/pathway with the database being specified in the connection string. Command goes like:
Db.Open

Firing of the query

Next step goes to the writing of the SQL Query and executing it. We write a sql query in a variable and that query is executed. On executing the query, a recordset object is returned which contains the result set of the query executed.
Getting the SQL Query:
SQL = “Select * from table1”

Executing the SQL query and capturing the recordset object returned:
Set rec_ob = Db.execute (SQL)

Accessing data with Record Set Object

As per the example, rec_ob is the recordset object containing the result of the query which was being executed. Now we can capture each record in the recordset. In general for looping down till end through the recordset we use the following:
Do while rec_ob.EOF <> true
Operation on records
Loop

Various important methods/events/properties and collection supported recordset object with explanation:
Properties:
BOF – Returns true if the current record position is before the first record,
otherwise false.
EOF - Returns true if the current record position is after the last record,
otherwise false
State – Returns a value that describes if the Recordset object is open, closed,
connecting, executing or retrieving data

Methods:
Open – Opens a Recordset
Close - Closes the Recordset
MoveFirst - Moves the record pointer to the first record
MoveLast - Moves the record pointer to the last record
MoveNext - Moves the record pointer to the next record
MovePrevious - Moves the record pointer to the previous record
Save - Saves a Recordset object to a file or a Stream Object

Events:
The various events supported by ADODB Recordset object cannot be handled using VBScript or JSCript (Only VB, V C++ and V J++ can handle these events). So we are not going discuss these over here.
Collections:
Fields - Indicates the number of field objects in the Recordset object
Properties - Contains all the Property objects in the Recordset object
The Fields Collection’s Properties:
Count - Returns the number of items in the fields collection. Starts at zero
Item (name/number) – Returns a specified item in the fields collection.

The Properties Collection’s Properties:
Count - Returns the number of items in the properties collection. Starts at
Zero
Item (name/number) – Returns a specified item in the properties collection.
Closing the connection

Once all the activities have been carried out on Recordset object and no more database accessing is record, you need to close the connection established by the ADODB object. Command goes like:
Db.Close

Releasing the memory space occupied by the Objects

The final work is to free up the space occupied by all the objects which were created to reference the objects created. This is done for freeing up the memory so that there is no memory leak.
Set Db = nothing

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IBM Rational TestManager

2009-03-14T02:54:00.000-07:00

IBM Rational TestManager

Rational® TestManager is the central console for test activity management, execution and reporting. Built for extensibility, it supports everything from pure manual test approaches to various automated paradigms including unit testing, functional regression testing, and performance testing. Rational TestManager is meant to be accessed by all members of a project team, ensuring the high visibility of test coverage information, defect trends, and application readiness. Rational TestManager is freely available to all users of IBM Rational® Functional Tester, Rational Manual Tester and IBM Rational® Robot. And because of its value to development teams, it is also included in the IBM Rational® Team Unifying Platform.

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IBM Rational Test RealTime

2009-03-14T02:53:00.000-07:00

IBM Rational Test RealTime

* Cross-platform solution for component testing and runtime analysis.
* Designed specifically for those who write code for embedded and other types of pervasive computing products.
* Supports safety- and business-critical embedded applications.
* Allows you to be more proactive in your debugging, discovering and correcting errors before they make their way into production code.
* Automated source code review, which reports on adherence to guidelines for C source code.
* Integrates with IBM ® Rational® solutions for model-driven development, test management, and software configuration management.
* Integrates with industry-leading third-party tools, such as Mathworks Simulink, Microsoft Visual Studio, and TI Code Composer Studio.
* Eclipse plug-in allowing for seamless integration for Runtime Analysis with the Eclipse C/C++ Development Tools (CDT)

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IBM Rational Software Modeler

2009-03-14T02:52:00.000-07:00

IBM Rational Software Modeler

IBM® Rational® Software Modeler is a robust UML™ 2.0-based visual modeling and design tool.

Enables architects, systems analysts, designers and others to specify and communicate development project information from several perspectives and to various stakeholders.

* Extends Eclipse 3.3 open software development environment.
* Is easy to install and use, with flexible installation options in a single product for Microsoft® Windows® and Linux®.
* Provides rich support for modeling with the UML 2.1 as well as for creation of UML-based Domain Specific Language environments and “simplified” UML modeling environments
* Enables flexible model management for parallel development and architectural re-factoring, e.g., split, combine, compare merge models/model fragments.
* Helps ease the transition between the architecture and the code with model-to-model and model-to-code transformations, including reverse transformations.
* Allows you to apply included design patterns — and/or author your own — to ensure that conventions and best practices are followed.
* Integrates with other facets of the lifecycle — including requirements, change management and process guidance; includes Rational ClearCase® LT. O
* perating systems supported: Linux, Windows

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IBM Rational Rose Data Modeler

2009-03-14T02:50:00.002-07:00

IBM Rational Rose Data Modeler

IBM® Rational Rose® Data Modeler offers a sophisticated visual modeling environment for database application development

Accelerate your processes by connecting the database designers to the rest of the development team through a common tool and the Unified Modeling Language™ (UML™) v1.4.

Enables database designers to visualize how the application accesses the database, so problems are escalated and resolved before deployment

Enables the creation of the object models, data models and data storage models and provides the ability to map logical and physical models to flexibly evolve database designs into the application's logic

Supports round-trip engineering between the data model, object model and defined data language (DDL) file/database management system (DBMS) and offers transformation synchronization options (synchronization between data model and object model during transformation)

Offers a data model-object model comparison wizard, supports forward engineering of an entire database at a time, and integrates with other IBM Rational Software Development lifecycle tools

Provides the ability to integrate with any SCC-compliant version control system, including IBM Rational ClearCase®

Provides Web publish models and reports to improve communication across the extended team

Operating systems supported: HP Unix, Linux, Sun Solaris, Windows

View features and benefits : Rational Rose Data Modeler is a visual modeling tool that makes it possible for database designers, analysts, architects, developers and anyone else on your development team to work together, capturing and sharing business requirements, and tracking them as they change throughout the process. It provides the realization of the ER methodology using UML notation to bring database designers together with the software development team. With UML, the database designer can capture information like constraints, triggers and indexes directly on the diagram rather than representing them with hidden properties behind the scenes. Rational Rose Data Modeler gives you the freedom to transfer between object and data models and take advantage of basic transformation types such as many-to-many relationships. This tool provides an intuitive way to visualize the architecture of the database and how it ties into the application.

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IBM Rational Robot

2009-03-14T02:50:00.001-07:00

IBM Rational Robot

Rational Robot is a test automation tool for functional testing of client/server applications.
Test automation tool for QA teams for testing client/server applications. Enables defect detection, includes test cases and test management, supports multiple UI technologies.

o Provides a general-purpose test automation tool for QA teams for functional testing of client/server applications
o Lowers learning curve for testers discovering the value of test automation processes
o Enables test-automation engineers to detect defects by extending test scripts and to define test cases
o Provides test cases for common objects and specialized test cases to development environment objects
o Includes built-in test management, integrates with IBM Rational Unified Process tools
o Aids in defect tracking, change management and requirements traceability
o Supports multiple UI technologies
o Operating systems supported: Windows

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IBM Rational RequisitePro

2009-03-14T02:48:00.000-07:00

IBM Rational RequisitePro

Uses advanced real-time integration with Microsoft® Word to provide a familiar environment for activities such as requirements definition and organization

Incorporates a powerful database infrastructure to facilitate requirements organization, integration, traceability and analysis

Enables detailed attribute customization and filtering to maximize the informative value of each requirement

Provides a fully functional, scaleable web interface optimized for usage in a geographically distributed environment

Provides detailed traceability views that display parent/child relationships and shows requirements that may be affected by upstream or downstream changes

Performs project version comparisons using XML-based project baselines
Integrates with multiple tools in the IBM Software Delivery Platform to improve accessibility, communication and traceability of requirements
Operating systems supported: Windows

Features and benefits : Software development is a team endeavor, so it is critical that team members possess a shared understanding of their project's vision, goals, specifications and requirements. But how can this be achieved when teams are geographically distributed and functionally isolated, failing to communicate with each other in a timely, clear, consistent manner? The IBM Rational RequisitePro solution addresses this need.

Rational RequisitePro is an easy to use requirements management tool that lets team's author and share their requirements using familiar document-based methods while leveraging database-enabled capabilities such as requirements traceability and impact analysis. The result is better communication and management of requirements with the increased likelihood of completing projects on time, within budget and above expectations. Successful projects start with requirements management - the more effective the execution, the greater the resulting quality and customer satisfaction.

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IBM Rational PurifyPlus

2009-03-14T02:47:00.001-07:00

IBM Rational PurifyPlus

IBM® Rational® PurifyPlus™ is an award-winning dynamic analysis solution designed to help developers write faster, more reliable code. It includes four basic capabilities packaged into a single product: 1) Memory debugging (identifies memory blocks that no longer have a valid pointer), 2) Memory leak detection (identifies memory blocks that no longer have a valid pointer), 3) Performance profiling: (highlights application performance bottlenecks and improves application understanding with a graphical representation of function calls) and 4) Code coverage (identifies untested code with line-level precision). PurifyPlus is supported on Windows, Linux, Solaris, AIX and HP-UX.

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IBM Rational Performance Tester

2009-03-14T02:45:00.002-07:00

IBM Rational Performance Tester

Performance Tester is a multi-user load testing and performance testing tool for validating Web application scalability.
Creates, executes and analyzes tests to validate the reliability of complex e-business applications.

* Provides no code testing, point and click wizards, report readability, usability and customization
* Delivers both high-level and detailed views of tests with a rich, tree-based text editor
* Performs capacity planning tests to ensure optimal investment in hardware and IT infrastructure.
* Delivers automatic identification and support for dynamic server responses
* Enables large, multi-user tests with minimal hardware resources.
* Diagnoses the root cause of performance bottlenecks by quickly identifying slow performing lines of code and integrates with Tivoli® composite application management solutions to identify the source of production performance problems.

Supports HTTP, Siebel, SAP®, SIP, Entrust, Citrix and SOA/Web Services Supports Windows, Linux and z/OS as distributed

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IBM Rational Manual Tester

2009-03-14T02:45:00.001-07:00

IBM Rational Manual Tester

A manual test authoring and execution tool for testers and business analysts who want to improve the speed, breadth, and reliability of their manual testing efforts.

Rational® Manual Tester is a manual test authoring and execution tool that improves testing quality.
Test authoring and execution tool to improve speed, breadth, and reliability of manual testing. Enables content sharing across distributed test sites, and promotes reuse.

o Provides manual test authoring and execution for testers and domain specialists to improve the speed, breadth, and reliability of their manual testing efforts.
o Promotes reuse of test steps to reduce the impact of software change on manual test maintenance activities.
o Improves productivity by allowing users to define and select keywords for tasks common to multiple tests.
o Leverages automated keywords from Rational Functional Tester for more efficient and accurate test execution.
o Improve test coverage with data driven tests
o Seamless integration with Rational ClearQuest which enables the submission of defects during creation, execution, and during post execution analysis directly to ClearQuest from Manual Tester shell.
o Offers assisted data entry and verification during test execution to reduce human error.
o Operating systems supported: Windows

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IBM Rational Functional Tester

2009-03-14T02:44:00.000-07:00

IBM Rational Functional Tester

Rational® Functional Tester is an automated, functional testing and regression testing tool.
Provides testers with automated testing capabilities for functional testing, regression testing, GUI testing and data-driven testing.

* Provides testers with automated capabilities for data-driven and keyword testing
* Offers testers a choice of scripting language and industrial-strength editor: Java in Eclipse® or Microsoft® Visual Basic .NET® in Visual Studio .NET - for test authoring and customization
* Supports custom controls through proxy SDK (Java/.Net)
* Provides definition and creation of automated keywords that can be leveraged by both manual and automated functional tests
* Includes ScriptAssure™ technology and pattern-matching capabilities to improve test script resiliency for frequent application user interface changes
* Supports version control to enable parallel development of test scripts and concurrent usage by geographically distributed teams
* Provides automated testing, functional testing, and regression testing of Web-based. .Net, Java, 3270 (zSeries™) and 5250 (iSeries™), Siebel, and SAP ®applications

Operating systems supported: Linux

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Glossary - M (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:24:00.001-08:00

Metric: A standard of measurement. Software metrics are the statistics describing the structure or content of a program. A metric should be a real objective measurement of something such as number of bugs per lines of code.

Monkey Testing: Testing a system or an Application on the fly, i.e just few tests here and there to ensure the system or an application does not crash out.

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Glossary - L (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:23:00.000-08:00

Load Testing: See Performance Testing.

Localization Testing: This term refers to making software specifically designed for a specific locality.

Loop Testing: A white box testing technique that exercises program loops.

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Glossary - I (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:22:00.002-08:00

Independent Test Group (ITG): A group of people whose primary responsibility is software testing,

Inspection: A group review quality improvement process for written material. It consists of two aspects; product (document itself) improvement and process improvement (of both document production and inspection).

Integration Testing: Testing of combined parts of an application to determine if they function together correctly. Usually performed after unit and functional testing. This type of testing is especially relevant to client/server and distributed systems.

Installation Testing: Confirms that the application under test recovers from expected or unexpected events without loss of data or functionality. Events can include shortage of disk space, unexpected loss of communication, or power out conditions.

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Glossary - H (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:22:00.001-08:00

High Order Tests: Black-box tests conducted once the software has been integrated.

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Glossary - G (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:21:00.000-08:00

Glass Box Testing: A synonym for White Box Testing.

Gorilla Testing: Testing one particular module,functionality heavily.

Gray Box Testing: A combination of Black Box and White Box testing methodologies: testing a piece of software against its specification but using some knowledge of its internal workings.

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Glossary - F (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:20:00.002-08:00

Emulator: A device, computer program, or system that accepts the same inputs and produces the same outputs as a given system.

Endurance Testing: Checks for memory leaks or other problems that may occur with prolonged execution.

End-to-End testing: Testing a complete application environment in a situation that mimics real-world use, such as interacting with a database, using network communications, or interacting with other hardware, applications, or systems if appropriate.

Equivalence Class: A portion of a component's input or output domains for which the component's behaviour is assumed to be the same from the component's specification.

Equivalence Partitioning: A test case design technique for a component in which test cases are designed to execute representatives from equivalence classes.

Exhaustive Testing: Testing which covers all combinations of input values and preconditions for an element of the software under test.

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Glossary - E (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:20:00.001-08:00

Glossary - D (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:19:00.000-08:00

Data Dictionary: A database that contains definitions of all data items defined during analysis.

Data Flow Diagram: A modeling notation that represents a functional decomposition of a system.

Data Driven Testing: Testing in which the action of a test case is parameterized by externally defined data values, maintained as a file or spreadsheet. A common technique in Automated Testing.

Debugging: The process of finding and removing the causes of software failures.

Defect: Nonconformance to requirements or functional / program specification

Dependency Testing: Examines an application's requirements for pre-existing software, initial states and configuration in order to maintain proper functionality.

Depth Testing: A test that exercises a feature of a product in full detail.

Dynamic Testing: Testing software through executing it. See also Static Testing.

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Glossary - C (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:18:00.000-08:00

CAST: Computer Aided Software Testing.

Capture/Replay Tool: A test tool that records test input as it is sent to the software under test. The input cases stored can then be used to reproduce the test at a later time. Most commonly applied to GUI test tools.

CMM: The Capability Maturity Model for Software (CMM or SW-CMM) is a model for judging the maturity of the software processes of an organization and for identifying the key practices that are required to increase the maturity of these processes.

Cause Effect Graph: A graphical representation of inputs and the associated outputs effects which can be used to design test cases.

Code Complete: Phase of development where functionality is implemented in entirety; bug fixes are all that are left. All functions found in the Functional Specifications have been implemented.

Code Coverage: An analysis method that determines which parts of the software have been executed (covered) by the test case suite and which parts have not been executed and therefore may require additional attention.

Code Inspection: A formal testing technique where the programmer reviews source code with a group who ask questions analyzing the program logic, analyzing the code with respect to a checklist of historically common programming errors, and analyzing its compliance with coding standards.

Code Walkthrough: A formal testing technique where source code is traced by a group with a small set of test cases, while the state of program variables is manually monitored, to analyze the programmer's logic and assumptions.

Coding: The generation of source code.

Compatibility Testing: Testing whether software is compatible with other elements of a system with which it should operate, e.g. browsers, Operating Systems, or hardware.

Component: A minimal software item for which a separate specification is available.
Component Testing: See Unit Testing.

Concurrency Testing: Multi-user testing geared towards determining the effects of accessing the same application code, module or database records. Identifies and measures the level of locking, deadlocking and use of single-threaded code and locking semaphores.

Conformance Testing: The process of testing that an implementation conforms to the specification on which it is based. Usually applied to testing conformance to a formal standard.

Context Driven Testing: The context-driven school of software testing is flavor of Agile Testing that advocates continuous and creative evaluation of testing opportunities in light of the potential information revealed and the value of that information to the organization right now.

Conversion Testing: Testing of programs or procedures used to convert data from existing systems for use in replacement systems.

Cyclomatic Complexity: A measure of the logical complexity of an algorithm, used in white-box testing.

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Glossary - B (part 1)

2009-01-06T22:17:00.000-08:00

B

Backus-Naur Form: A metalanguage used to formally describe the syntax of a language.

Basic Block: A sequence of one or more consecutive, executable statements containing no branches.

Basis Path Testing: A white box test case design technique that uses the algorithmic flow of the program to design tests.

Basis Set: The set of tests derived using basis path testing.

Baseline: The point at which some deliverable produced during the software engineering process is put under formal change control.

Benchmark Testing: Tests that use representative sets of programs and data designed to evaluate the performance of computer hardware and software in a given configuration.

Beta Testing: Testing of a rerelease of a software product conducted by customers.

Binary Portability Testing: Testing an executable application for portability across system platforms and environments, usually for conformation to an ABI specification.

Black Box Testing: Testing based on an analysis of the specification of a piece of software without reference to its internal workings. The goal is to test how well the component conforms to the published requirements for the component.

Bottom Up Testing: An approach to integration testing where the lowest level components are tested first, then used to facilitate the testing of higher level components. The process is repeated until the component at the top of the hierarchy is tested.

Boundary Testing: Test which focus on the boundary or limit conditions of the software being tested. (Some of these tests are stress tests).

Bug: A fault in a program which causes the program to perform in an unintended or unanticipated manner.

Boundary Value Analysis: BVA is similar to Equivalence Partitioning but focuses on "corner cases" or values that are usually out of range as defined by the specification. his means that if a function expects all values in range of negative 100 to positive 1000, test inputs would include negative 101 and positive 1001.

Branch Testing: Testing in which all branches in the program source code are tested at least once.

Breadth Testing: A test suite that exercises the full functionality of a product but does not test features in detail.

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Software Project Managment

2008-12-19T00:51:00.000-08:00

Software Project Managment

Software Project Management is all about managing Planning, Monitoring and Execution of Project Management In general there are four successive processes that bring a system into being

Requirement Gathering
Feasibility Study
Project Planning
Project Execution

a) Requirement Gathering
The requirements process is a full system life cycle set of activities that includes:

Understanding the customers' needs and expectations
Identifying and analyzing the requirements
Defining the requirements
Clarifying and restating the requirements
Prioritizing requirements
Partitioning requirements
Tracking requirements
Managing requirements
Testing and verifying requirements
Validating requirements

Requirements analysis and management needs additional attention as a key factor in the success of systems and software development projects.

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Recommended Requirements Gathering Practices

2008-12-19T00:50:00.000-08:00

The following is a list of recommended requirements gathering practices. They are based on the author's extensive review of industry literature combined with the practical experiences of requirements analysts who have supported dozens of projects.

Understand a project vision and scope document.

Initiate a project glossary that provides definitions of words that are acceptable to and used by customers/users and the developers, and a list of acronyms to facilitate effective communication.

Evolve the real requirements via a "joint" customer/user and developer effort. Focus on product benefits (necessary requirements), not features. Address the minimum and highest priority requirements needed to meet real customer and user needs.

Document the rationale for each requirement (why it is needed).

Establish a mechanism to control changes to requirements and new requirements.

Prioritize the real requirements to determine those that should be met in the first release or product and those that can be addressed subsequently.

When the requirements are volatile (and perhaps even when they are not), consider an incremental development approach. This acknowledges that some of the requirements are "unknowable" until customers and users start using the system.

Use peer reviews and inspections of all requirements work products.

Use an industry-strength automated requirements tool.

Assign attributes to each requirement.
Provide traceability.
Maintain the history of each requirement.

Involve customers and users throughout the development effort.

Perform requirements validation and verification activities in the requirements gathering process to ensure that each requirement is testable.

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Quality testing dashboard

2008-12-19T00:49:00.000-08:00

Quality testing dashboard
The tool would gather information as test cases were created, as problem reports were entered, and as test cases were executed. The data would automatically be gathered into a database and online up to the second, and reporting would be available at all times.

Because the test management system fosters a structured test process, it can provide several reports and processes that would otherwise require extensive manual data collection, organization, analysis, and reporting.

Throughout the lifecycle of a project, the test management system can provide relevant status reporting to facilitate planning, test execution, results tracking, and release decisions.

1. During test development, reports are available to determine what work has been completed and what tasks remain open.

2. During execution, the test management system tracks scripts that have been executed and those that have not, the result of the execution of each script, and the requirements coverage achieved and links to defects reported due to failed test cases, to provide a complete view of the release readiness.

Reports just based on defect tracking data show incomplete status; for example, a report that there are ten open defects does not tell much, unless we know how many test cases have been executed and how much requirements coverage is achieved by these test cases. We can use test management data to generate this missing information. Test case metrics complement defect reports metrics and give a better view of product quality.

Apart from this, other reports can be generated based on different attributes like type of test, modules, etc. Test management can provide objective, accurate, real-time information, which is just what is needed for deciding on the quality of a product. This is the most important benefit of having a structured testing process and tool. Based on test reports available, the product manager can make informed decisions about the quality of the application under development.

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Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - Risk Analysis 5

2008-12-19T00:48:00.002-08:00

Risk Assessment for Projects
At least 50% of all projects (if not much more) are not successful in the sense that they do not achieve their objectives, or do not deliver the promised results, or sacrifice the predefined quality, or are not completed in the given time schedule, or use much more resources than originally planned.

There is a multitude of reasons for projects to fail. Projects often come on top of the usual work load and members of the project team belong to different departments, i.e. they have their first accountability to their line manager which often brings them into conflict with the project work. Team members have to work overtime if they want to complete their project tasks. At the end, project work is often sacrificed, and time budgets are often not sufficient.

What is mostly neglected: the occurrence of problems in project implementation increases with the complexity and length of the project.Larger and more complex projects that run over more than a year have other reasons of failure. Often these projects have permanent staff who are released from other tasks and work full time on the project, and well established budgets. However, those projects depend on a large number of external assumptions which influence their outcomes. It is impossible to clearly predict the future and the impact of various influence factors that are uncertain. Many project plans are too rigid to flexibly respond to changing needs.

Common to most projects is the lack of appropriate and transparent communication. Team members (and other stakeholders) often do not share a common understanding of the project's goals and strategies. It is important to unveil these misunderstandings and hidden agendas from the very beginning. The following tool, if applied in a project planning session helps to uncover issues that otherwise might remain undiscussed.

Explanations:

Business Level: Does the project have a strategic importance for the organization?
Length: How long is the intended implementation time?
Complexity: Does the project cover various business areas / objectives?
Technology: Is the technology to be applied well-established or is it a technology which yet has to be developed?
Number of organizational units involved: cross functional / geographical areas, etc.
Costs: estimated costs of the project
Overall risk of failure: How would you personally rank the risk that the project cannot achieve the objectives with the intended resources?

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Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 5

2008-12-19T00:48:00.001-08:00

Effort Estimation
Effort estimation consists in predict how many hours of work and how many workers are needed to develop a project. The effort invested in a software project is probably one of the most important and most analysed variables in recent years in the process of project management. The determination of the value of this variable when initiating software projects allows us to plan adequately any forthcoming activities. As far as estimation and prediction is concerned there is still a number of unsolved problems and errors. To obtain good results it is essential to take into consideration any previous projects. Estimating the effort with a high grade of reliability is a problem which has not yet been solved and even the project manager has to deal with it since the beginning.

Cost Estimation
It is the responsibility of the project manager to make accurate estimations of effort and cost. This is particularly true for projects subject to competitive bidding where a bid too high compared with competitors would result in loosing the contract or a bid too low could result in a loss to the organisation . This does not mean that internal projects are unimportant. From a project leaders estimate the management often decide whether to proceed with the project. Industry has a need for accurate estimates of effort and size at a very early stage in a project. However, when software cost estimates are done early in the software development process the estimate can be based on wrong or incomplete requirements. A software cost estimate process is the set of techniques and procedures that an organisation use to arrive at an estimate. An important aspect of software projects is to know the cost, The major contributing factor is effort.

Why SCE is difficult and error prone ?

Software cost estimation requires a significant amount of effort to perform it correctly.
SCE is often done hurriedly, without an appreciation for the effort required.
You need experience at developing estimates, especially for large projects.
Human bias i.e An Estimator is likely to consider how long a certain portion of the system would take, and then to merely extrapolate this estimate to the rest of the system, ignoring the non-linear aspects of software development.

The causes of poor and inaccurate estimation

imprecise and drifting requirements
new software projects are nearly always different form the last.
software practitioners don't collect enough information about past projects.
estimates are forced to match the resources available.

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Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 4

2008-12-19T00:44:00.000-08:00

Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 3

2008-12-19T00:43:00.000-08:00

Interfaces Analysis.
Missing or incorrect interfaces are often a major cause of cost overruns and product failures. Identifying external interfaces early clarifies product scope, aids risk assessment, reduces product development costs, and improves customer satisfaction. The steps of identifying, simplifying, controlling, documenting, communicating, and monitoring interfaces help to reduce the risk of problems related to interfaces.

Please see attached Requirement Analysis Template

b) The feasibility Study
The Feasibility Study uses technical information and cost data to determine the economic potential and practicality (i.e. feasibility) of a project. The Feasibility Study uses techniques that help evaluate a project and/or compare it with other projects. Factors such as interest rates, operating costs, and depreciation are generally considered. The following questions are answered during feasibility study

An abstract definition of problem
Formulation of different Solution strategy
Examination of alternative solution strategy (in terms of benefits, Resource requirement, costs etc)
Cost and benefit analysis to determine the best strategy

Who uses it?
Technical Architect, Business Analyst, Configuration Manager, Development Manager, Project Manager, IT Manager, System Administrator, Test Manager, Documentation Manager, Technical Writers, System Administrator.

When is it used?
The Feasibility Study analyses potential solutions against a set of requirements, evaluates their ability to meet these objectives, describe a recommended solution, and offer a justification for this selection.

c) Project Planning
When a project is estimated to be feasible, project planning is done. Project planning consist of the following steps

Effort, Cost, Resource and Project Duration planning
Risk Analysis and mitigation plan
Project Scheduling
Staffing organization and Staffing Plan

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Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 2

2008-12-19T00:42:00.000-08:00

Prototyping.
Prototyping is a technique for building a quick and rough version of a desired system or parts of that system. The prototype illustrates the capabilities of the system to users and designers. It serves as a communications mechanism to allow reviewers to understand interactions with the system. Prototyping sometimes gives an impression that developers are further along than is actually the case, giving users an overly optimistic impression of completion possibilities. Prototypes can be combined effectively with other approaches such as JAD and models.

Use Cases.
A use case is a picture of actions a system performs, depicting the actors. It should be accompanied by a textual description and not be used in isolation of other requirements gathering techniques. Use cases should always be supplemented with quality attributes and other information such as interface characteristics. Many developers believe that use cases and scenarios (descriptions of sequences of events) facilitate team communication. They provide a context for the requirements by expressing sequences of events and a common language for end users and the technical team.

Be cautioned that use cases alone do not provide enough information to enable development activities. Other requirements elicitation techniques should also be used in conjunction with use cases. Use operational concepts as a simple, cost-effective way to build a consensus among stakeholders and to address two large classes of requirements errors: omitted requirements and conflicting requirements. Operational concepts identify user interface issues early, provide opportunities for early validation, and form a foundation for testing scenarios in product verification.

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Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 1

2008-12-19T00:41:00.000-08:00

Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques

Following are a set of recommended requirements elicitation techniques. These techniques can be used in combination. Their advantages are that they are effective in emerging the real requirements for planned development efforts.

Interviews
Interviews are used to gather information. However, the predisposition, experience, understanding, and bias of the person being interviewed influence the information obtained. The use of context-free questions by the interviewer helps avoid prejudicing the response . A context-free question is a question that does not suggest a particular response. For example, who is the client for this system? What is the real reason for wanting to solve this problem? What environment is this product likely to encounter? What kind of product precision is required?

Document Analysis
All effective requirements elicitation involves some level of document analysis such as business plans, market studies, contracts, requests for proposals, statements of work, existing guidelines, analyses of existing systems, and procedures. Improved requirements coverage results from identifying and consulting all likely sources of requirements.

Brainstorming
Brainstorming involves both idea generation and idea reduction. The goal of the former is to identify as many ideas as possible, while the latter ranks the ideas into those considered most useful by the group. Brainstorming is a powerful technique because the most creative or effective ideas often result from combining seemingly unrelated ideas. Also, this technique encourages original thinking and unusual ideas.

Requirements Workshops.
Requirements workshops are a powerful technique for eliciting requirements because they can be designed to encourage consensus concerning the requirements of a particular capability. They are best facilitated by an outside expert and are typically short (one or a few days). Other advantages are often achieved -- participant commitment to the work products and project success, teamwork, resolution of political issues, and reaching consensus on a host of topics. Benefits of requirements workshops include the following:

Workshop costs are often lower than are those for multiple interviews.
They help to give structure to the requirements capture and analysis process.
They are dynamic, interactive, and cooperative.
They involve users and cut across organizational boundaries.
They help to identify and prioritize needs and resolve contentious issues.
When properly run, they help to manage user's expectations and attitude toward change

A special category of requirements workshop is a Joint Application Development (JAD) workshop. JAD is a method for developing requirements through which customers, user representatives, and developers work together with a facilitator to produce a requirements specification that both sides support.

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Glossary - A (part 1)

2008-12-19T00:39:00.000-08:00

A

Acceptance Testing: Testing conducted to enable a user/customer to determine whether to accept a software product. Normally performed to validate the software meets a set of agreed acceptance criteria.

Accessibility Testing: Verifying a product is accessible to the people having disabilities (deaf, blind, mentally disabled etc.).

Ad Hoc Testing: A testing phase where the tester tries to 'break' the system by randomly trying the system's functionality. Can include negative testing as well. See also Monkey Testing.

Agile Testing: Testing practice for projects using agile methodologies, treating development as the customer of testing and emphasizing a test-first design paradigm. See also Test Driven Development.

Application Binary Interface (ABI): A specification defining requirements for portability of applications in binary forms across defferent system platforms and environments.
Application Programming Interface (API): A formalized set of software calls and routines that can be referenced by an application program in order to access supporting system or network services.

Automated Software Quality (ASQ): The use of software tools, such as automated testing tools, to improve software quality.

Automated Testing: Testing employing software tools which execute tests without manual intervention. Can be applied in GUI, performance, API, etc. testing. The use of software to control the execution of tests, the comparison of actual outcomes to predicted outcomes, the setting up of test preconditions, and other test control and test reporting functions.

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Tools Available - 5

2008-12-18T01:11:00.000-08:00

Tools Available - 5

eValid - Web test tool from Software Research, Inc that uses a 'Test Enabled Web Browser' test engine that provides browser-based client side quality checking, dynamic testing, content validation, page performance tuning, and webserver load and capacity analysis. Utilizes multiple validation methods.

Rational Functional Tester - IBM's (formerly Rational's) automated tool for testing of Java, .NET, and web-based applications. Enables data-driven testing, choice of scripting languages and editors. For Windows and Linux.

e-Test Suite - Integrated functional/regression test tool from Empirix for web applications and services and .NET and J2EE applications; includes site monitoring and load testing capabilities, and record/playback, scripting language, test process management capabilities. Includes full VBA script development environment and options such as javascript, C++, etc. DOM-based testing and validation; 'Data Bank Wizard' simplifies creation of data-driven tests. Evaluation version available.

QuickTest Pro - Functional/regression test tool from Mercury; includes support for testing Web, Java, ERP, etc.

Winrunner - Functional/regression test tool from Mercury; includes support for testing Web, Java, ERP, etc.

Compuware's QARun - QARun for functional/regression testing of web, Java, and other applications. Handles ActiveX, HTML, DHTML, XML, Java beans, and more.

SilkTest - Functional test tool from Segue for Web, Java or traditional client/server-based applications. Features include: test creation and customization, test planning and management, direct database access and validation, recovery system for unattended testing, and IDE for developing, editing, compiling, running, and debugging scripts, test plans, etc.

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Tools Available - 4

2008-12-18T01:10:00.000-08:00

Tools Available - 4

HTTP-WebTest - A Perl module which runs tests on remote URLs or local Web files containing Perl/JSP/HTML/JavaScript/etc., and generates a detailed test report. This module can be used "as-is" or its functionality can be extended using plugins. Plugins can define test types and provide additional report capabilities. This module comes with a set of default plugins, but can be easily extended with third-party plugins. Open-source project maintained by Ilya Martynov.

HttpUnit - Open source Java program for accessing web sites without a browser, from SourceForge.net/Open Source Development Network, designed and implemented by Russell Gold. Ideally suited for automated unit testing of web sites when combined with a Java unit test framework such as JUnit. Emulates the relevant portions of browser behavior, including form submission, basic http authentication, cookies and automatic page redirection, and allows Java test code to examine returned pages as text, an XML DOM, or containers of forms, tables, and links. Includes ServletUnit to test servlets without a servlet container.

iOpus Internet Macros - Macro recorder utility from iOpus Inc. automates repetitious aspects of web site testing. Records any combination of browsing, form filling, clicking, script testing and information gathering; assists user during the recording with visual feedback. Power users can manually edit a recorded macro. A command line interface allows for easy integration with other test software. Works by remote controlling the browser, thus automatically supports advanced features such as SSL, HTTP-Redirects and cookies. Can handle data input from text files, databases, or XML. Can extract web data and save as CSV file or process the data via a script. For Windows and MSIE.

MaxQ - Free open-source web functional testing tool from Tigris.org, written in Java. Works as a proxy server; includes an HTTP proxy recorder to automate test script generation, and a mechanism for playing tests back from the GUI and command line. Jython is used as the scripting language, and JUnit is used as the testing library.

TestWeb - Test tool from Original Software Group Ltd. utilizes a new approach to recording/playback of web browser scripts. It analyses the underlying intentions of the script and executes it by direct communication with web page elements. IntelliScripting logic removes the reliance on specific browser window sizes, component location and mouse movements for accurate replay, for easier script maintenance; supports hyperlinks targeted at new instances of browser. Playback can run in background while other tasks are performed on the same machine.

Compuware TestPartner - Automated software testing tool from Compuware designed specifically to validate Windows, Java, and web-based applications. The 'TestPartner Visual Navigator' can create visual-based tests, or MS VBA can be used for customized scripting.

WebKing - Web site functional, load, and static analysis test suite from ParaSoft. Maps and tests all possible paths through a dynamic site; can enforce over 200 HTML, CSS, JavaScript, 508 compliance, WML and XHTML coding standards or customized standards. Allows creation of rules for automatic monitoring of dynamic page content. Can run load tests based on the tool's analysis of web server log files. For Windows, Linux, Solaris.

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Tools Available - 3

2008-12-18T01:09:00.000-08:00

Tools Available - 3

TestAgent - Capture/playback tool for user acceptance testing from Strenuus, LLC. Key features besides capture/playback include automatically detecting and capturing standard and custom content errors. Reports information needed to troubleshoot problems. Enables 'Persistent Acceptance Testing' that activates tests each time a web application is used.

MITS.GUI - Unique test automation tool from Omsphere LLC; has an intelligent state machine engine that makes real-time decisions for navigating through the GUI portion of an application. It can test thousands of test scenarios without use of any scripts. Allows creation of completely new test scenarios without ever having performed that test before, all without changing tool, testware architecture (object names, screen names, etc), or logic associated with the engine. Testers enter test data into a spreadsheet used to populate objects that appear for the particular test scenario defined.

Badboy - Tool from Bradley Software to aid in building and testing dynamic web based applications. Combines sophisticated capture/replay ability with performance testing and regression features. Free for most uses; source code avalable.

SAMIE - Free tool designed for QA engineers - 'Simple Automated Module For Internet Explorer'. Perl module that allows a user to automate use of IE via Perl scripts; Written in ActivePerl, allowing inheritance of all Perl functionality including regular expressions, Perl dbi database access, many Perl cpan library functions. Uses IE's built in COM object which provides a reference to the DOM for each browser window or frame. Easy development and maintenance - no need to keep track of GUI maps for each window. For Windows.

PAMIE - Free open-source 'Python Automated Module For Internet Explorer' Allows control of an instance of MSIE and access to it's methods though OLE automation . Utilizes Collections, Methods, Events and Properties exposed by the DHTML Object Model.

PureTest - Free tool from Minq Software AB, includes an HTTP Recorder and Web Crawler. Create scenarios using the point and click interface. Includes a scenario debugger including single step, break points and response introspection. Supports HTTPS/SSL, dynamic Web applications, data driven scenarios, and parsing of response codes or parsing page content for expected or unexpected strings. Includes a Task API for building custom test tasks. The Web Crawler is useful for verifying consistency of a static web structure, reporting various metrics, broken links and the structure of the crawled web. Multi-platform - written in Java.

Solex - Web application testing tool built as a plug-in for the Eclipse IDE (an open, extensible IDE). Records HTTP messages by acting as a Web proxy; recorded sessions can be saved as XML and reopened later. HTTP requests and responses are fully displayed in order to inspect and customize their content. Allows the attachment of extraction or replacement rules to any HTTP message content, and assertions to responses in order to validate a scenario during its playback.

QA Wizard - Automated functional web test tool from Seapine Software. Advanced object binding reduces script changes when Web-based apps change. Next-generation scripting language eliminates problems created by syntax or other language errors. Includes capability for automated scripting, allowing creation of more scripts in less time. Supports unlimited set of ODBC-compatible data sources as well as MS Excel, tab/comma delimited file formats, and more. Free Demo and Test Script available. For Windows platforms.

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Tools Available - 2

2008-12-18T01:08:00.002-08:00

Tools Available - 2

WebInject - Open source tool in PERL for automated testing of web applications and services. Can be used to unit test any individual component with an HTTP interface (JSP, ASP, CGI, PHP, servlets, HTML forms, etc.) or it can be used to create a suite of HTTP level functional or regression tests.

Site Test Center - Functional and performance test tool from Alliance Software Engineering. Has an XML-based scripting capability to enable modifying captured scripts or creating new scripts. Utilizes a distributed testing model and consists of three parts: STC Administrator, STC Master and STC Master Service.

jWebUnit - Open source Java framework that facilitates creation of acceptance tests for web applications. Provides a high-level API for navigating a web application combined with a set of assertions to verify the application's correctness including navigation via links, form entry and submission, validation of table contents, and other typical business web application features. Utilizes HttpUnit behind the scenes. The simple navigation methods and ready-to-use assertions allow for more rapid test creation than using only JUnit and HttpUnit.

SimpleTest - Open source unit testing framework which aims to be a complete PHP developer test solution. Includes all of the typical functions that would be expected from JUnit and the PHPUnit ports, but also adds mock objects; has some JWebUnit functionality as well. This includes web page navigation, cookie testing and form submission.

WinTask - Macro recorder from TaskWare, automates repetitive tasks for Web site testing (and standard Windows applications), with its HTML objects recognition. Includes capability to expand scope of macros by editing and adding loops, branching statements, etc. (300+ commands); ensure robustness of scripts with Synchronization commands. Includes a WinTask Scheduler.

TestCaseMaker/Runner - Test case document driven functional test tool for web applications from Agile Web Development. Maker creates test case documents, and Runner executes the test case document; test case documents are always synchronized with the application. Free including source code.

Canoo WebTest - Free Java Open Source tool for automatic functional testing of web applications. XML-based test script code is editable with user's preferred XML editor; until recording capabilities are added, scripts have to be developed manually. Can group tests into a testsuite that again can be part of a bigger testsuite. Test results are reported in either plain text or XML format for later presentation via XSLT. Standard reporting XSLT stylesheets included, and can be adapted to any reporting style or requirements.

TestSmith - Functional/Regression test tool from Quality Forge. Includes an Intelligent, HTML/DOM-Aware and Object Mode Recording Engine, and a Data-Driven, Adaptable and Multi-Threaded Playback Engine. Handles Applets, Flash, Active-X controls, animated bitmaps, etc. Controls are recorded as individual objects independent of screen positions or resolution; playback window/size can be different than in capture. Special validation points, such as bitmap or text matching, can be inserted during a recording, but all recorded items are validated and logged 'on the fly'. Fuzzy matching capabilities. Editable scripts can be recorded in SmithSript language or in Java, C++ or C++/MFC. 90-day evaluation copy available.

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Tools Available - 1

2008-12-18T01:08:00.001-08:00

Tools Available - 1

IeUnit - IeUnit is an open-source simple framework to test logical behaviors of web pages, released under IBM's Common Public License. It helps users to create, organize and execute functional unit tests. Includes a test runner with GUI interface. Implemented in JavaScript for the Windows XP platform with Internet Explorer.

QEngine Web Test Studio - Web functional test tool from AdventNet. Scripting uses Jython; records using page elements controls symbolically rather than with raw screen coordinate. Secure recording on password fields; data-driven Test wizard to fetch script data from external source; provision to add GUI, Database and File checkpoints and verify database tables, files, page titles and HTML element properties. Supports keyword-driven testing, built-in exception handling and reporting facility. Works with a variety of browsers and OS's. Free and professional versions available.

AppPerfect DevSuite - Suite of testing, tuning, and monitoring products from AppPefect Corp. that includes a web functional testing module. Records browser interaction by element instead of screen co-ordinates. Supports handling dynamic content created by JavaScript; supports ASP, JSP, HTML, cookies, SSL. For Windows and MSIE; integrates with a variety of IDE's.

JStudio SiteWalker - Test tool from Jarsch Software Studio allows capture/replay recording; fail definitions can be specified for each step of the automated workflow via JavaScript. JavaScript's Document Object Model enables full access to all document elements. Test data from any database or Excel spreadsheet can be mapped to enter values automatically into HTML form controls. HTML-based test result reports can be generated. Shareware for Windows/MSIE.

Test Complete Enterprise - Automated test tool from AutomatedQA Corp. includes web functional testing capabilities. Works with Internet Explorer. QEngine - Test tool from AdventNet enables functional testing of Web sites and Web-based applications. Record and playback capability; automatic recording of any Web browser events and translates into an Python editable scripts. Includes Script Editor, Application Map Editor to view and edit the map object properties. Supports multiple OS's and browsers.

actiWate - Java-based Web application testing environment from Actimind Inc. Advanced framework for writing test scripts in Java (similar to open-source frameworks like HttpUnit, HtmlUnit etc. but with extended API), and Test Writing Assistant - Web browser plug-in module to assist the test writing process. Freeware.

KUMO Editor - Toolset from Softmorning LTD for creation and editing of web macros and automated web tests. Includes syntax-coloring editor with intellisense, autocomplete, run-time debugging features. Macro recorder transforms any click to a C# directive. Page objects navigator allows browsing of hierarchy of web objects in a page. Enables creation of scenarios from spreadsheets; and loop, retry on error, robust handling of page modifications. Can export created .DLL and .EXE files to enable running web macros on demand and integration into other software frameworks. Multilingual for Asian, eastern and western European languages.

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The Goals of Bug Writing

2008-12-18T01:07:00.000-08:00

The Goals of Bug Writing

As with all other forms of writing, it‘s important to remember who your audience is. Usually, the bug will be written for developers and for other QA engineers. Know also that other departments may need to understand the bug: marketing, tech support, etc. You can assume that everyone who may read the bug will have some understanding about the product which the bug is logged against and the technology used. They may not, however, know much about your specific test area.

1. Eliminate basic questions that a Development Engineer might have by including essential information.
2. Understand your audience: make steps understandable for other departments (tech support, marketing) or other testers not in your area.
3. Make searching easier for yourself and others.
4. Write in a way that demonstrates you‘ve done necessary isolation.

Title
Keep the title short and sweet. It should be as explicit as possible in as few words as possible. Think again about what the title will be used for and who might use it. A QA engineer might be looking to match their bug against what‘s already logged and needs a quick way to scan through the titles. Distill each bug to its crucial elements and put that in the title.

1. Try to write in a cause-and-effect manner (―When A is done, B happens,‖ or ―B happens when A is done.‖)
2. Avoid ambiguous wording, such as ―feature is broken/incorrect behavior/does not work,‖ etc. Instead, say precisely how it‘s broken, incorrect, or not working.
3. Use keywords that will make searching for the bug easier for yourself or someone else looking for duplicate bugs. Avoid using jargon, slang, or vocabulary that is too specific to your area.
4. When an assert appears in your bug, include the assert or a portion of the assert in the title(e.g., ―Assert, ‗index < fLength‘ when pasting text into very small text frame‖).

Description

This is where all of the information, the body of the bug, resides: Steps to Reproduce, Actual Results, Expected Results, and any other helpful or vital information regarding the bug.

Steps to Reproduce Bug reports usually suffer from two deficiencies:
1. Too many steps, often poorly organized. Having too many steps in a bug report makes it difficult to read and understand, especially given the confined viewing area in Vantive.
2. Too little information in a bug often leads to unnecessary extra effort and time. Often a bug will be sent back by the engineer as Cannot Reproduce as a result of the inability to follow poorly constructed steps in a valid bug. This can also indicate that you haven‘t completed enough isolation steps.

Essential information to include in Steps to Reproduce:
1. Setup variables: Indicate which printers, fonts, or drivers are necessary to reproduce this bug. Indicate the working OS, if it‘s essential information for reproducing this bug.
2. Environmental variables. For example, indicate if you are working in application or document mode.

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Test Management System - test design and procedure development

2008-12-18T01:06:00.000-08:00

Test Management System

Test design and procedure development
At the test design stage, testers will create a description of each test, document its scope and objective, and include any information that helps illustrate the purpose of a specific test such as requirements documents, functional specifications, etc. During the test development phase, testers will document detailed test execution steps and define the expected results for each step. The test management system will help in defining and documenting test cases by providing standard Web-based, pre-formatted template forms with fields based on the product and component information for editing and creating test cases. These get posted to the centralized database. This enables standardization and consistency across the testing team. It will also help in linking to the requirements specification to ensure traceability and test coverage. The test case may have been created due to a known defect and gets an association created with that defect. We can define the sequence in which test cases should be executed. This may be based on functional dependencies or some other factors like risk and other priority.

Organization
To verify application functionality and usability, tests have to realistically emulate end-user behavior. To achieve this, test execution should follow predefined logic, such as running certain tests after other tests have passed, failed, or been completed. For example, a user logs into the system, enters a new order and then exits the system. To emulate this simple business process, it makes sense to run the tests following the exact same sequence: log in, insert order, log out. The execution logic rules should be set prior to executing the actual tests.

Review
Once the test cases have been created, we can get them reviewed by required team members and customers. It is easy to communicate the test cases to the team because of the Web interface. This will verify the test cases developed by the test team and improve them further if required before actual testing begins.

Execution
The test cases can be accessed from any computer over the intranet/Internet, depending on how the test management tool is deployed. The test management system will help in locating a test case and provide a Web interface to process the test case. As the test is processed, the tester can immediately log the actual results along with pass/fail results and additional comments. The Web-based process supports parallel execution of test cases by many team members, which is not possible with a single flat file that gets "routed" around. If the test ever fails, it has an associated defect number which the tester can look at to see if a previous defect report should be opened, or a new one created. This helps to ensure that nothing falls through the cracks.

Maintenance
The test management system will maintain an accurate history of each run, including execution configuration, date and time of run, who ran the test, and any defects that were uncovered during the run.

Defect management
When a test case fails, the tester can enter the ID of the defect that caused the case to fail. The defect is, of course, inserted into the defect tracking system. The defect can be linked with the test cases. This will provide information to reproduce and analyze the defects.

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Bug Logging , Writing , Reporting

2008-12-18T01:04:00.002-08:00

Bug Logging / Writing / Reporting

The first aim of a bug report is to let the programmer see the failure with their own eyes. If you can't be with them to make it fail in front of them, give them detailed instructions so that they can make it fail for themselves.

In case the first aim doesn't succeed, and the programmer can't see it failing themselves, the second aim of a bug report is to describe what went wrong. Describe everything in detail.State what you saw, and also state what you expected to see. Write down the error messages, especially if they have numbers in.

When your computer does something unexpected, freeze. Do nothing until you're calm, and don't do anything that you think might be dangerous. By all means try to diagnose the fault yourself if you think you can, but if you do, you should still report the symptoms as well.

Be ready to provide extra information if the programmer needs it. If they didn't need it, they wouldn't be asking for it. They aren't being deliberately awkward. Have version numbers at your fingertips, because they will probably be needed. Write clearly. Say what you mean, and make sure it can't be misinterpreted. Above all, be precise. Programmers like precision. Useful bug reports are ones that get bugs fixed. A useful bug report normally has two qualities:

1. Reproducible. If an engineer can't see it or conclusively prove that it exists, the engineer will probably stamp it WORKSFORME or INVALID, and move on to the next bug. Every relevant detail you can provide helps.

2. Specific. The quicker the engineer can isolate the issue to a specific problem, the more likely it'll be expediently fixed. If you're crashing on a site, please take the time to isolate what on the page is triggering the crash, and include it as an HTML snippet in the bug report if possible. (Specific bugs have the added bonus of remaining relevant when an engineer actually gets to them; in a rapidly changing web, a bug report of "foo.com crashes my browser" becomes meaningless after the site experiences a half-dozen redesigns and hundreds of content changes.)

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Automated Testing - Manual Vs Automation

2008-12-18T01:04:00.001-08:00

Automated Testing - Manual Vs Automation

If you‘re only going to run the test one or two times or the test is really expensive to automation, it is most likely a manual test. But then again, what good is saying ―use common sense‖ when you need to come up with deterministic set of guidelines on how and when to automate?

Pros of Automation

If you have to run a set of tests repeatedly, automation is a huge win for you
It gives you the ability to run automation against code that frequently changes to catch regressions in a timely manner
It gives you the ability to run automation in mainstream scenarios to catch regressions in a timely manner
Aids in testing a large test matrix (different languages on different OS platforms).
Automated tests can be run at the same time on different machines, whereas the manual tests would have to be run sequentially.

Cons of Automation

It costs more to automate.
Writing the test cases and writing or configuring the automate framework you‘re using costs more initially than running the test manually.
Can‘t automate visual references, for example, if you can‘t tell the font color via code or the automation tool, it is a manual test.

Pros of Manual
If the test case only runs twice a coding milestone, it most likely should be a manual test. Less cost than automating it.
It allows the tester to perform more ad-hoc (random testing). More bugs are found via ad-hoc than via automation. And, the more time a tester spends playing with the feature, the greater the odds of finding real user bugs.

Cons of Manual
1. Running tests manually can be very time consuming
2. Each time there is a new build, the tester must rerun all required tests - which after a while would become very mundane and tiresome.

Other deciding factors
1. What you automate depends on the tools you use. If the tools have any limitations, those tests are manual.
2. Is the return on investment worth automating?
3. Is what you get out of automation worth the cost of setting up and supporting the test cases, the automation framework, and the system that runs the test cases?

Criteria for automating

There are two sets of questions to determine whether automation is right for your test case: Is this test scenario automatable?
1. Yes, and it will cost a little
2. Yes, but it will cost a lot
3. No, it is no possible to automate

How important is this test scenario?
1. I must absolutely test this scenario whenever possible
2. I need to test this scenario regularly
3. I only need to test this scenario once in a while

If you answered #1 to both questions – definitely automate that test
If you answered #1 or #2 to both questions – you should automate that test
If you answered #2 to both questions – you need to consider if it is really worth the investment to automate

What happens if you can‘t automate?

Let‘s say that you have a test that you absolutely need to run whenever possible, but it isn‘t possible to automate. Your options are

Reevaluate – do I really need to run this test this often?
What‘s the cost of doing this test manually?
Look for new testing tools
Consider test hooks

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Automated Testing

2008-12-18T01:02:00.000-08:00

Automated Testing

Test automation is used to replace or supplement traditional manual software testing with a suite of test programs. Benefits to QA Engineers include increased software quality, repeatable test procedures, and reduced testing costs. Essentially, software automation testing is using a computer system instead of a human to test a software application. Most other forms of software testing require human interaction with the software product under development

Automated Testing is done to:

1. REDUCE TESTING TIME. A typical automated test suite will run in less than 24 hours. For a sophisticated product, manual testing may require dozens of staff months to perform the same testing.
2. CONSISTENT TEST PROCEDURES. With a complex testing process manual testing often yields inconsistent coverage and results depending on the staff and schedule employed. An automated test suite ensures the same scope and process is used repeatedly each time testing is performed

3. REDUCED QA COSTS. Automated testing has an upfront cost to develop, but over the lifetime of a product it will offer substantial net savings. An average automated test suite development is 3-5 times the cost of a complete manual test cycle. Over multiple product releases with multiple cycles per release, this cost is quickly recouped

4. IMPROVED TESTING PRODUCTIVITY. With its much shorter execution time an automated test suite can be run multiple times over the course of a product development cycle

5. IMPROVED PRODUCT QUALITY. Automated testing detects functional and performance issues more efficiently

Points to consider:

1. it's important to define the purpose of taking on a test automation effort. There are several categories of testing tools each with its own purpose. Identifying what you want to automate and where in the testing life cycle will be the first step in developing a test automation strategy. Just wishing that everything should be tested faster is not a practical strategy. You need to be specific

2. Developing a test automation strategy is very important in mapping out what's to be automated, how it's going to be done, how the scripts will be maintained and what the expected costs and benefits will be

3. Many of the testing 'tools' provided by vendors are very sophisticated and use coding 'languages'. Treat the entire process of automating testing as you would any other software development effort. This includes defining what should be automated, (the requirements phase), designing test automation, writing the scripts, testing the scripts,etc. The scripts need to be maintained over the life of the product just as any program would require maintenance

4. The effort of test automation is an investment. More time and resources are needed. The benefit comes from running these automated tests every subsequent release. Therefore, ensuring that the scripts can be easily maintained becomes very important

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White Box Testing Techniques

2008-12-16T03:09:00.001-08:00

White Box Testing Techniques

1. Basis Path Testing
a. Flow Graph Notation
b. Cyclomatic Complexity
c. Deriving Test Cases
d. Graph Matrices

2. Control Structure testing
a. Conditions Testing
b. Data Flow Testing
c. Loop Testing

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Usability Testing

2008-12-16T03:08:00.000-08:00

Usability testing is a special form of testing that looks for bugs not in the functionality of the program, but in the layout and utility of the user interface. This step is often performed on a prototype before the actual system code is written, so it is easy to change if needed. For usability testing, you need to plan:

01. How you will choose the users for the test (what is a representative sample of your real user population?)

02. A set of tasks for the users to perform representing paths through your system showing key functionality

03. A method for getting feedback from the users - surveys, interviews, data collection in the system itself

04. How you will analyze the data you collected in order to make improvements to the user interface

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Types of Black Box Testing

2008-12-16T03:07:00.000-08:00

Acceptance Testing / User Acceptance Testing - UAT Formal tests (often performed by a customer) to determine whether or not a system has satisfied predetermined acceptance criteria. These tests are often used to enable the customer (either internal or external) to determine whether or not to accept a system.

The test procedures that lead to formal 'acceptance' of new or changed systems. User Acceptance Testing is a critical phase of any 'systems' project and requires significant participation by the 'End Users'. To be of real use, an Acceptance Test Plan should be developed in order to plan precisely, and in detail, the means by which 'Acceptance' will be achieved. The final part of the UAT can also include a parallel run to prove the system against the current system.

The User Acceptance Test Plan will vary from system to system but, in general, the testing should be planned in order to provide a realistic and adequate exposure of the system to all reasonably expected events. The testing can be based upon the User Requirements Specification to which the system should conform.

As in any system though, problems will arise and it is important to have determined what will be the expected and required responses from the various parties concerned; including Users; Project Team; Vendors and possibly Consultants / Contractors.

In order to agree what such responses should be, the End Users and the Project Team need to develop and agree a range of 'Severity Levels'. These levels will range from (say) 1 to 6 and will represent the relative severity, in terms of business / commercial impact, of a problem with the system, found during testing. Here is an example which has been used successfully; '1' is the most severe; and '6' has the least impact :-

'Show Stopper' i.e. it is impossible to continue with the testing because of the severity of this error / bug

Critical Problem; testing can continue but we cannot go into production (live) with this problem

Major Problem; testing can continue but live this feature will cause severe disruption to business processes in live operation

Medium Problem; testing can continue and the system is likely to go live with only minimal departure from agreed business processes

Minor Problem ; both testing and live operations may progress. This problem should be corrected, but little or no changes to business processes are envisaged

'Cosmetic' Problem e.g. colours; fonts; pitch size However, if such features are key to the business requirements they will warrant a higher severity level.

The users of the system, in consultation with the executive sponsor of the project, must then agree upon the responsibilities and required actions for each category of problem. For example, you may demand that any problems in severity level 1, receive priority response and that all testing will cease until such level 1 problems are resolved.

Caution. Even where the severity levels and the responses to each have been agreed by all parties; the allocation of a problem into its appropriate severity level can be subjective and open to question. To avoid the risk of lengthy and protracted exchanges over the categorisation of problems; we strongly advised that a range of examples are agreed in advance to ensure that there are no fundamental areas of disagreement; or, or if there are, these will be known in advance and your organisation is forewarned.

Finally, it is crucial to agree the Criteria for Acceptance. Because no system is entirely fault free, it must be agreed between End User and vendor, the maximum number of acceptable 'outstandings' in any particular category. Again, prior consideration of this is advisable.

N.B. In some cases, users may agree to accept ('sign off') the system subject to a range of conditions. These conditions need to be analysed as they may, perhaps unintentionally, seek additional functionality which could be classified as scope creep. In any event, any and all fixes from the software developers, must be subjected to rigorous System Testing and, where appropriate Regression Testing.

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Testing Documents

2008-12-16T03:06:00.002-08:00

a. User Requirements Specification - URS

The User Requirements Specification is a document produced by, or on behalf of your organisation, which documents the purposes for which a system is required - its functional requirements - usually in order of priority / gradation.

Whilst the URS will not usually probe the technical specification, it will nevertheless outline the expectations and, where essential may provide further detail e.g. the User Interface, say Microsoft Windows®, and the expected hardware platform etc.

The URS is an essential document which outlines precisely what the User (or customer) is expecting from this system. The term User Requirement Specification can also incorporate the functional requirements of the system or may be in a separate document labelled the Functional Requirements Specification - the FRS.

b. Test Plan

A software project test plan is a document that describes the objectives, scope, approach, and focus of a software testing effort. The process of preparing a test plan is a useful way to think through the efforts needed to validate the acceptability of a software product. The completed document will help people outside the test group understand the 'why' and 'how' of product validation. It should be thorough enough to be useful but not so thorough that no one outside the test group will read it. The following are some of the items that might be included in a test plan, depending on the particular project:

Title

Identification of software including version/release numbers
Revision history of document including authors, dates, approvals
Table of Contents
Purpose of document, intended audience
Objective of testing effort
Software product overview
Relevant related document list, such as requirements, design documents, other test plans, etc.
Relevant standards or legal requirements
Traceability requirements
Relevant naming conventions and identifier conventions
Overall software project organization and personnel/contact-info/responsibilties
Test organization and personnel/contact-info/responsibilities
Assumptions and dependencies
Project risk analysis
Testing priorities and focus
Scope and limitations of testing
Test outline - a decomposition of the test approach by test type, feature, functionality, process, system, module, etc. as applicable
Outline of data input equivalence classes, boundary value analysis, error classes
Test environment - hardware, operating systems, other required software, data configurations, interfaces to other systems
Test environment validity analysis - differences between the test and production systems and their impact on test validity.
Test environment setup and configuration issues
Software migration processes
Software CM processes
Test data setup requirements
Database setup requirements
Outline of system-logging/error-logging/other capabilities, and tools such as screen capture software, that will be used to help describe and report bugs
Discussion of any specialized software or hardware tools that will be used by testers to help track the cause or source of bugs
Test automation - justification and overview Test tools to be used, including versions, patches, etc.
Test script/test code maintenance processes and version control

c. Test Case

01. A test case is a document that describes an input, action, or event and an expected response, to determine if a feature of an application is working correctly. A test case should contain particulars such as test case identifier, test case name, objective, test conditions/setup, input data requirements, steps, and expected results.
02. Note that the process of developing test cases can help find problems in the requirements or design of an application, since it requires completely thinking through the operation of the application. For this reason, it's useful to prepare test cases early in the development cycle if possible.

d. Test Script

A test script is basically a script of test cases linked together to walk the critical pathways through an application under test. These scripts are broken down into a series of user scenarios. Each scenario contains specific instructions for the tester to carry out, including the expected results along the way

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Test Data Categorization Techniques

2008-12-16T03:06:00.001-08:00

1. Equivalence Partitioning

Divide the input domain into classes of data for which test cases can be generated.

Attempting to uncover classes of errors.

An equivalence class represents a set of valid or invalid states An input condition is either a specific numeric value, range of values, a set of related values, or a boolean condition.

Equivalence classes can be defined by:

If an input condition specifies a range or a specific value, one valid and two invalid equivalence classes defined.
If an input condition specifies a boolean or a member of a set, one valid and one invalid equivalence classes defined.

Test cases for each input domain data item developed and executed.

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Some Testing Terms - part 2

2008-12-16T03:05:00.000-08:00

6. SEI

'Software Engineering Institute' at Carnegie-Mellon University; initiated by the U.S. Defense Department to help improve software development processes.

7. CMM

'Capability Maturity Model', now called the CMMI ('Capability Maturity Model Integration'), developed by the SEI. It's a model of 5 levels of process 'maturity' that determine effectiveness in delivering quality software. It is geared to large organizations such as large U.S. Defense Department contractors. However, many of the QA processes involved are appropriate to any organization, and if reasonably applied can be helpful. Organizations can receive CMMI ratings by undergoing assessments by qualified auditors.

Level 1 - characterized by chaos, periodic panics, and heroic efforts required by individuals to successfully complete projects. Few if any processes in place; successes may not be repeatable.

Level 2 - software project tracking, requirements management, realistic planning, and configuration management processes are in place; successful practices can be repeated.

Level 3 - standard software development and maintenance processes are integrated throughout an organization; a Software Engineering Process Group is is in place to oversee software processes, and training programs are used to ensure understanding and compliance.

Level 4 - metrics are used to track productivity, processes, and products. Project performance is predictable, and quality is consistently high.

Level 5 - the focus is on continouous process improvement. The impact of new processes and technologies can be predicted and effectively implemented when required.

Perspective on CMM ratings: During 1997-2001, 1018 organizations were assessed. Of those, 27% were rated at Level 1, 39% at 2, 23% at 3, 6% at 4, and 5% at 5. (For ratings during the period 1992-96, 62% were at Level 1, 23% at 2, 13% at 3, 2% at 4, and 0.4% at 5.) The median size of organizations was 100 software engineering/maintenance personnel; 32% of organizations were U.S. federal contractors or agencies. For those rated at Level 1, the most problematical key process area was in Software Quality Assurance.

8. ISO

'International Organisation for Standardization' - The ISO 9001:2000 standard (which replaces the previous standard of 1994) concerns quality systems that are assessed by outside auditors, and it applies to many kinds of production and manufacturing organizations, not just software. It covers documentation, design, development, production, testing, installation, servicing, and other processes. The full set of standards consists of: (a)Q9001-2000 - Quality Management Systems: Requirements; (b)Q9000-2000 - Quality Management Systems: Fundamentals and Vocabulary; (c)Q9004-2000 - Quality Management Systems: Guidelines for Performance Improvements. To be ISO 9001 certified, a third-party auditor assesses an organization, and certification is typically good for about 3 years, after which a complete reassessment is required. Note that ISO certification does not necessarily indicate quality products - it indicates only that documented processes are followed. Also see http://www.iso.ch/ for the latest information. In the U.S. the standards can be purchased via the ASQ web site at http://e-standards.asq.org/

9. IEEE

'Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers' - among other things, creates standards such as 'IEEE Standard for Software Test Documentation' (IEEE/ANSI Standard 829), 'IEEE Standard of Software Unit Testing (IEEE/ANSI Standard 1008), 'IEEE Standard for Software Quality Assurance Plans' (IEEE/ANSI Standard 730), and others.

10. ANSI

'American National Standards Institute', the primary industrial standards body in the U.S.; publishes some software-related standards in conjunction with the IEEE and ASQ (American Society for Quality).

Other software development/IT management process assessment methods besides CMMI and ISO 9000 include SPICE, Trillium, TickIT, Bootstrap, ITIL, MOF, and CobiT.

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Some Testing Terms - part 1

2008-12-16T03:04:00.000-08:00

1. Validation:

The comparison between the actual characteristics of something (e.g. a product of a software project and the expected characteristics).Validation is checking that you have built the right system.

2. Verification:

The comparison between the actual characteristics of something (e.g. a product of a software project) and the specified characteristics.Verification is checking that we have built the system right.

3. Configuration Management

Configuration management covers the processes used to control, coordinate, and track: code, requirements, documentation, problems, change requests, designs, tools/compilers/libraries/patches, changes made to them, and who makes the changes.

4. When to stop testing

This can be difficult to determine. Many modern software applications are so complex, and run in such an interdependent environment, that complete testing can never be done. Common factors in deciding when to stop are:

Deadlines (release deadlines, testing deadlines, etc.)
Test cases completed with certain percentage passed
Test budget depleted
Coverage of code/functionality/requirements reaches a specified point
Bug rate falls below a certain level
Beta or alpha testing period ends

5. Risk Analysis/ Identifying Test Cases

Use risk analysis to determine where testing should be focused. Since it's rarely possible to test every possible aspect of an application, every possible combination of events, every dependency, or everything that could go wrong, risk analysis is appropriate to most software development projects. This requires judgement skills, common sense, and experience. (If warranted, formal methods are also available.) Considerations can include:

01 Which functionality is most important to the project's intended purpose?
02 Which functionality is most visible to the user?
03 Which functionality has the largest safety impact?
04 Which functionality has the largest financial impact on users?
05 Which aspects of the application are most important to the customer?
06 Which aspects of the application can be tested early in the development cycle?
07 Which parts of the code are most complex, and thus most subject to errors?
08 Which parts of the application were developed in rush or panic mode?
09 Which aspects of similar/related previous projects caused problems?
10 Which aspects of similar/related previous projects had large maintenance expenses?
11 Which parts of the requirements and design are unclear or poorly thought out?
12 What do the developers think are the highest-risk aspects of the application?
13 What kinds of problems would cause the worst publicity?
14 What kinds of problems would cause the most customer service complaints?
15 What kinds of tests could easily cover multiple functionalities?
16 Which tests will have the best high-risk-coverage to time-required ratio?

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Control Structure testing

2008-12-16T03:03:00.000-08:00

a. Conditions Testing
Condition testing aims to exercise all logical conditions in a program module.

Errors in expressions can be due to:
1. Boolean operator error
2. Boolean variable error
3. Boolean parenthesis error
4. Relational operator error
5. Arithmetic expression error

Condition testing methods focus on testing each condition in the program. Strategies proposed include:

Branch testing - execute every branch at least once.

Domain Testing - uses three or four tests for every relational operator.

Branch and relational operator testing - uses condition constraints

Coverage of the constraint set guarantees detection of relational operator errors.

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Bugs

2008-12-16T03:02:00.000-08:00

Bug

A programming error that causes a program to work poorly, produce incorrect results, or crash. (As an interesting aside, the term "bug" was coined when a real insect damaged one of the circuits of the first electronic digital computer, the ENIAC.)

Isolation

Think about the sequence of events that you just took the software through to eventually get to the problem. Ideally, you started testing by clicking one button, and then saw the problem immediately. More likely, though, you had been testing for a while, possibly for hours. Perhaps the last thing you did is the only thing required to reproduce the bug, or maybe you have to repeat hours of testing. Until you can prove that a simpler scenario is sufficient, you have to assume that every detail of your testing session is relevant. Your task is to rule out as many of those details as you can as not being relevant to the problem.

There are several different things that are subject to simplification. Consider:

Procedures. This is usually what testers focus on – shortening the step-by-step interaction with the system.

Inputs. This is all the data that you feed to the program, such as a command-line argument, a text field in a GUI interface, a file, or database. You want to also reduce this data to the smallest data set that still reproduces the problem.

Configuration. What options have you selected that are different from the default configuration? If you can't reproduce the problem the way the software is configured out of the box, find the few crucial settings that are necessary for the problem to show up.

Platforms. Can you reproduce the problem on all of the operating systems, operating system versions, and hardware combinations that are supported? If not, then you've found an important clue. Also, what about other software that is running, and their versions? Many bugs are not platform-specific, and testing on other platforms can sometimes be difficult, so this area often isn't thoroughly explored.

Other state information. The items above probably don't capture every possible relevant variable. Look for other things that might vary from one system to another and cause the bug to manifest on some systems but not others

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Basis Path Testing

2008-12-16T02:22:00.000-08:00

Basis Path Testing
Aim is to derive a logical complexity measure of a procedural design and use this as a guide for defining a basic set of execution paths.
Test cases which exercise basic set will execute every statement at least once.

a. Flow Graph Notation

Notation for representing control flow
On a flow graph:
1. Arrows called edges represent flow of control
2. Circles called nodes represent one or more actions.
3. Areas bounded by edges and nodes called regions.
4. A predicate node is a node containing a condition

Any procedural design can be translated into a flow graph.Note that compound Boolean expressions at tests generate at least two predicate node and additional arcs.

b. Cyclomatic Complexity

The cyclomatic complexity gives a quantitative measure of the logical complexity.

This value gives the number of independent paths in the basis set, and an upper bound for the number of tests to ensure that each statement is executed at least once.

An independent path is any path through a program that introduces at least one new set of processing statements or a new condition (i.e., a new edge)

Example has:

1. Cyclomatic Complexity of 4. Can be calculated as:
1. Number of regions of flow graph.
2. #Edges - #Nodes + 2
3. #Predicate Nodes + 1

2. Independent Paths:

1. 1, 8
2. 1, 2, 3, 7b, 1, 8
3. 1, 2, 4, 5, 7a, 7b, 1, 8
4. 1, 2, 4, 6, 7a, 7b, 1, 8

Cyclomatic complexity provides upper bound for number of tests required to guarantee coverage of all program statements.

c. Deriving Test Cases

1. Using the design or code, draw the corresponding flow graph.
2. Determine the cyclomatic complexity of the flow graph.
3. Determine a basis set of independent paths.
4. Prepare test cases that will force execution of each path in the basis set.

Note: some paths may only be able to be executed as part of another test.

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Glossary - M (part 1)

2008-09-24T02:05:00.000-07:00

Glossary - L (part 1)

2008-09-24T02:04:00.000-07:00

Glossary - I (part 1)

2008-09-24T02:03:00.002-07:00

Independent Test Group (ITG): A group of people whose primary responsibility is software testing,

Inspection: A group review quality improvement process for written material. It consists of two aspects; product (document itself) improvement and process improvement (of both document production and inspection).

Integration Testing: Testing of combined parts of an application to determine if they function together correctly. Usually performed after unit and functional testing. This type of testing is especially relevant to client/server and distributed systems.

Installation Testing: Confirms that the application under test recovers from expected or unexpected events without loss of data or functionality. Events can include shortage of disk space, unexpected loss of communication, or power out conditions.

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Glossary - H (part 1)

2008-09-24T02:03:00.001-07:00

Glossary - G (part 1)

2008-09-24T02:02:00.001-07:00

Glossary - F (part 1)

2008-09-24T02:01:00.000-07:00

Functional Decomposition: A technique used during planning, analysis and design; creates a functional hierarchy for the software.

Functional Specification: A document that describes in detail the characteristics of the product with regard to its intended features.

Functional Testing: See also Black Box Testing.

Testing the features and operational behavior of a product to ensure they correspond to its specifications.

Testing that ignores the internal mechanism of a system or component and focuses solely on the outputs generated in response to selected inputs and execution conditions.

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Glossary - E (part 1)

2008-09-24T02:00:00.000-07:00

Glossary - D (part 1)

2008-09-24T01:59:00.000-07:00

Glossary - C (part 1)

2008-09-24T01:58:00.000-07:00

Glossary - B (part 1)

2008-09-24T01:57:00.000-07:00

SOFTWARE PROJECT MANAGEMENT

2008-09-20T00:22:00.001-07:00

SOFTWARE PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Software Project Management is all about managing Planning, Monitoring and Execution of Project Management In general there are four successive processes that bring a system into being

Requirement Gathering
Feasibility Study
Project Planning
Project Execution

a) Requirement Gathering
The requirements process is a full system life cycle set of activities that includes:

Understanding the customers' needs and expectations
Identifying and analyzing the requirements
Defining the requirements
Clarifying and restating the requirements
Prioritizing requirements
Partitioning requirements
Tracking requirements
Managing requirements
Testing and verifying requirements
Validating requirements

Requirements analysis and management needs additional attention as a key factor in the success of systems and software development projects.

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Recommended Requirements Gathering Practices

2008-09-20T00:21:00.000-07:00

Quality testing dashboard

2008-09-20T00:20:00.000-07:00

Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - Risk Analysis 5

2008-09-20T00:19:00.002-07:00

Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 5

2008-09-20T00:19:00.001-07:00

Effort Estimation
Effort estimation consists in predict how many hours of work and how many workers are needed to develop a project. The effort invested in a software project is probably one of the most important and most analysed variables in recent years in the process of project management. The determination of the value of this variable when initiating software projects allows us to plan adequately any forthcoming activities. As far as estimation and prediction is concerned there is still a number of unsolved problems and errors. To obtain good results it is essential to take into consideration any previous projects. Estimating the effort with a high grade of reliability is a problem which has not yet been solved and even the project manager has to deal with it since the beginning.

Cost Estimation
It is the responsibility of the project manager to make accurate estimations of effort and cost. This is particularly true for projects subject to competitive bidding where a bid too high compared with competitors would result in loosing the contract or a bid too low could result in a loss to the organisation . This does not mean that internal projects are unimportant. From a project leaders estimate the management often decide whether to proceed with the project. Industry has a need for accurate estimates of effort and size at a very early stage in a project. However, when software cost estimates are done early in the software development process the estimate can be based on wrong or incomplete requirements. A software cost estimate process is the set of techniques and procedures that an organisation use to arrive at an estimate. An important aspect of software projects is to know the cost, The major contributing factor is effort.

Why SCE is difficult and error prone ?

Software cost estimation requires a significant amount of effort to perform it correctly.
SCE is often done hurriedly, without an appreciation for the effort required.
You need experience at developing estimates, especially for large projects.
Human bias i.e An Estimator is likely to consider how long a certain portion of the system would take, and then to merely extrapolate this estimate to the rest of the system, ignoring the non-linear aspects of software development.

The causes of poor and inaccurate estimation

imprecise and drifting requirements
new software projects are nearly always different form the last.
software practitioners don't collect enough information about past projects.
estimates are forced to match the resources available.

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Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 4

2008-09-20T00:18:00.001-07:00

Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 3

2008-09-20T00:17:00.000-07:00

Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 2

2008-09-20T00:16:00.000-07:00

Preferred Requirements Gathering Techniques - 1

2008-09-20T00:15:00.000-07:00

Glossary - A (part 1)

2008-09-20T00:14:00.001-07:00

Tools Available - 5

2008-09-18T00:19:00.000-07:00

Tools Available - 4

2008-09-18T00:18:00.000-07:00

Tools Available - 3

2008-09-18T00:16:00.002-07:00

Tools Available - 2

2008-09-18T00:16:00.001-07:00

Tools Available - 1

2008-09-18T00:15:00.001-07:00

The Goals of Bug Writing

2008-09-18T00:14:00.001-07:00

Test Management System - test design and procedure development

2008-09-18T00:13:00.001-07:00

Bug Logging , Writing , Reporting

2008-09-18T00:12:00.000-07:00

Automated Testing - Manual Vs Automation

2008-09-18T00:11:00.000-07:00

Automated Testing

2008-09-18T00:06:00.000-07:00