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September 2008 - Posts

Why computer science knowledge helps testers: Example #1

Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2008 10:54 AM by alanpa
There are many people who think Microsoft (and other companies, for that matter) hire programmers to be testers so they can write lot’s of automation. This, of course is not the case – we hire people who understand more about how computers work because Read More...
3 Comments

The "T", the "D", and the "DET"

Posted Thursday, September 25, 2008 8:05 PM by alanpa
I talk to a lot of testers at Microsoft. Testers at all levels and from all divisions. A topic that almost always comes up is the role of test at MS. It's something I've talked about before, but I want to spin the issue a different way. In many companies Read More...
4 Comments

A layer below the GUI

Posted Saturday, September 20, 2008 4:14 PM by alanpa
I wanted to expand on the main point of my last post – specifically on what a “layer below the GUI” means. All I mean is – don’t write automation that interacts with the GUI directly – instead, write automation that tests using an object model, or another Read More...
4 Comments

GUI schmooey

Posted Thursday, September 18, 2008 11:23 AM by alanpa
I answered a few questions this week about automating GUI tests. One question was about recommendations for GUI automation tools for non-coders, and the other was about how much time to spend on the GUI in an MVC (model-view-controller) application. The Read More...
16 Comments

Random Notes

Posted Sunday, September 14, 2008 9:21 PM by alanpa
I went through my drafts folder to pick a post to publish tonight, but none seemed appropriate, so you get nothing of interest. I finished up the "Test Test" follow up series last week and wasn't quite sure in what direction to go next. I just Read More...
1 Comments

Creating a Culture of Quality

Posted Tuesday, September 09, 2008 8:51 AM by alanpa
The 11th (and final) question in the Test Test asks if the organization has a culture of quality. Does everyone care about quality, or do they consider quality to be the test team's job? If everyone doesn't care about quality, how do you get them to start Read More...
2 Comments

Trustworthy Testing

Posted Saturday, September 06, 2008 8:54 PM by alanpa
I think I can lump some ideas of how to improve #8 and #10 (Are tests built daily, and does test code have the same "rules" as dev code) from the Test Test into one post. let me put it this way. Code written to test the product is NOT throwaway Read More...
4 Comments

The value of Manual testing (or…The value of Automated testing)

Posted Thursday, September 04, 2008 10:49 AM by alanpa
I’m skipping #8 for a minute so I can get to #9. I hope we all agree that it’s silly to take a perfectly find manual test and automate it. It’s also silly to take something that’s highly repetitive and easily automatable and NOT automate it. So, as is Read More...
7 Comments

Staying organized

Posted Tuesday, September 02, 2008 5:07 PM by alanpa
Test #7 of the Test Test asks if testers use test case management and source control tools. The only reason I can think of an org NOT to use these tools is if they were too cheap to buy them. In that case, use one of the many free tools out there for Read More...
3 Comments
 
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