http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx"But my job is to write test cases!" my friend said, almost plaintively. We were discussing the huge amount of work we have to do and the not-nearly-enough time in which we have to do it. I was relating my strategy: get my developers to do all the testingen-USTelligent Evolution Platform Developer Build (Build: 5.6.50428.7875)http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#593914Tue, 09 May 2006 23:31:31 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:593914humbugrealityTest is certainly never finished. The solution I think is first to make a clear statement as to what &quot;finished&quot; means for a milestone: all BVTs, FVTs, and Exit Criteria passing 100% and all other tests analyzed 100%, for example. Then you have to work with Dev and PM to ensure they understand what that means and get them to agree to not move on until that point is reached. But planning for the next milestone almost certainly will happen during the current milestone, so you have to build that into your schedule. <br> <br>The best way I know to get the entire feature team working together throughout a milestone - from initial design through signing off on the final product - is to integrate each discipline's concerns into the feature spec. If your feature specification includes details about what tests are going to be written, for example, it's much more likely that Dev and PM will be thinking about such matters from the start.<div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=593914" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#593391Tue, 09 May 2006 08:27:11 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:593391StellaI think lifecycles are crossed. Meaning when one cycle is not totally finished, the next cycle begins and some people released to do next cycle's tasks. for example, in the latter phase of the cycle, PD seems have time to design next generation's comment. But QAs have no time to get away. So how could QA and PD and Dev to work together in the former phase of the cycle (product design phase)?<div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=593391" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#584375Wed, 26 Apr 2006 20:38:17 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:584375humbugrealityOur feature team works together throughout the entire lifecycle of the feature, from before the spec is written until the last bugfix is in. Most definitely code quality is higher than it would be if we got involved later in the process!<div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=584375" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#583878Wed, 26 Apr 2006 09:45:26 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:583878StellaSeems you and your DEVs work very closely. And you involved in the process before code complete. So that code quality is higher when completed...<div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=583878" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#581971Mon, 24 Apr 2006 10:20:20 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:581971Anutthara MSFTMichael - I am going to start doing this on my team and report how successful I was in getting my devs to write tests that I recommend. Wait on that one... <br> - Anu <div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=581971" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#577646Mon, 17 Apr 2006 20:32:28 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:577646humbugrealityHmmm...the link opens for me. No idea what the problem might be. <br> <br>My conversations with developers usually start out something like &quot;I have some ideas regarding what needs to be tested for Feature X. Would you like to hear them?&quot; They say yes, and then we're off and running. <div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=577646" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#577351Mon, 17 Apr 2006 09:06:13 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:577351Stella&quot;working with ten developers to brainstorm ten sets of test cases that they write after I leave&quot; --- How do you work with them on this? <br> <br>BTW, I want to see the comments Sherman posted. but i can't open the link... <br> <br><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=577351" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#576893Sat, 15 Apr 2006 18:35:12 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:576893Scott LovelandGood post. I like to take this concept one step further, and ask those before my in the food chain to write test cases such that will fit into my automation framework. Not really any extra work for them, it's just a matter of certain choices to make when writing the test case. That way I get a nice workload I can run periodically to ensure that recent code changes haven't regressed previously tested function. And it's basically free. <div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=576893" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#576887Sat, 15 Apr 2006 17:45:33 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:576887humbugrealityI am an SDET (Software Design Engineer in Test). However, an STE's (Software Test Engineer, where one difference is that STEs tend to do mostly manual testing) job isn't to write test cases either.<div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=576887" width="1" height="1">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/micahel/archive/2006/04/12/myjobisnottowritetestcases.aspx#576760Sat, 15 Apr 2006 04:16:59 GMT91d46819-8472-40ad-a661-2c78acb4018c:576760JimAre you a SDET at Microsoft? Or do they have a separate group of software testers?<div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="http://blogs.msdn.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=576760" width="1" height="1">