Hi Again, So far we have talked about how features & benefits of MTLM when used for the tests that are predefined. E.g. creating actionable bugs, using fast forwarding & so on. Many times testers test the application in ways that are not predefined (i.e. no fixed flow of steps is prescribed by...

Hi Again, Let’s talk about an important concept in test case design – reusability. As testers you know that there are few steps that may be common in many test cases e.g. steps to log into the application may be common to multiple test cases. In other cases the cleanup steps (or any other steps in between...

Hi again, Today we will talk about data driving a test. As is very clear to all testers, if a test requires some data input in AUT, it should be tested with different data sets (e.g. verify that the application works with boundary conditions, wrong data, etc…). Different teams use different mechanism...

Hi again, In one of the previous blogs we had talked that to reduce the time spend on less important tasks, MTLM provides a functionality called Fast Forwarding. The goal of this feature was to allow testers to quickly go to the step in the test case where they want to focus their testing during this...

Hi Again, The next topic to cover is the filing actionable bugs using the tool. However, I already have an old blog that explains this in detail: http://blogs.msdn.com/vstsqualitytools/archive/2009/05/26/create-actionable-bugs.aspx Other links: - Video ALM 6 - Perform manual test and file actionable...

Hi again, As we discussed in last blog in this series, let’s explore the features & functionalities of Microsoft Test Runner (MTR). The component is used for execution of manual tests. Manual tests can be authored in the MTLM by going to Test Plan activity & choosing to create a new test. User...

Hi everyone, I hope you are using the MTLM beta2 release & finding it useful. I wanted to blog a few posts & talk about the Microsoft Test Runner component of the product that is used for execution of manual tests. I will talk about how it got started & what functionalities it provides to...

I'd like to announce the beta availability of Team Test's first PowerTool release for Visual Studio 2010: Test Scribe.  This tool allows users of Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate Beta 2 to generate a Word 2007-compatible Test Plan Document from their plan, suites, test cases, and other artifacts. ...

Note: Cross posted from Rubel's Blog . Permalink How can I configure MTM to use my custom bug / test case type? I got this Q on my previous blog and thought of posting a separate post on it as it's a bit tricky to do it and hence other folks may need this info. In Microsoft Test Manager (MLM...

Today, I will finally end this series of blog posts where I’ve been talking about the main differences that you will find in Planning and Testing views (although they appear to be very similar at a first glance). You can find the previous posts here: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Double clicking (or hitting...

In previous posts, I’ve been discussing why Planning and Testing views look similar but behave differently. You can refer to them by clicking on Part 1 , Part 2 , or Part 3 . Sometimes, depending on the organization, planning is done by some people, and execution is done by others. And even if it is...

Mouse Hover is an important part of a Application WorkFlow. Hovering on a control brings about changes in the application which leads to Controls appearing/disappearing , Properties of the controls being changed ,new windows coming up etc. Needless to say it is pertinent that all the Hover Actions are...

In part 1 and part 2 of the series, I have mentioned reasons why we use similar views for planning and executing test cases (and I have discussed what makes these views different). Today, I will focus on yet another specific reason: Configurations. We can use the ‘Planning view’ under ‘Contents’ ( Plan...

You might have noticed above many grids there are two distinct toolbars. The primary one has options for interacting with items in the list. The other one that is right-aligned is for managing the view. Here are some examples: 1. Verify Bugs – change which query is used: bugs assigned to me, bugs created...

Our doc team (we call them the User Education or the UE team) has been hard at work supplementing the product with great deal lot of additional documentation to help you understand the various features in the product and to best leverage them. The table below is a quick way to get to some of the more...

Terry Clancy, a Business Development Manager with Microsoft, has posted about opportunities for partners. It is also a good overview of the features across Team Test and Team Lab, how things fit together, and includes plenty of screenshot eye candy. http://blogs.msdn.com/terryclancy/archive/2009/11/18...

I talked about customizing work items and how this can be used with categories to get the best out of MTM before , now I will expand on that topic and show you how to compose queries to include this extra level of information. If you go to the Queries activity in MTM (under the Tracking menu) and...

In a previous blog post , I mentioned some of the reasons why the Planning and Testing views in MTM look very similar but behave differently. Today, in this post, I will continue talking about this. As you can see when playing around with the product, activity pages contain toolbars, with buttons...

I’ve posted an article on my MSDN blog about strategies and considerations when composing your test cases.  If you’re familiar with Test Case Authoring in MTLM ( Ryan Vogrinec and David R. Williamson both have helpful posts on the subject), you can read more about the possibilities and tradeoffs...

Test steps are very important in manual testing because they provide the detailed semantics on how each test case is to be validated and ultimately completed.  That said, if you consider most manual test cases will have several steps each and most organizations will have a number of test cases,...

We love to hear your feedback and given that our final beta for Visual Studio 2010 is now available this is your best opportunity to influence the product. In Microsoft Test and Lab Manager(MTLM) we are using the Microsoft Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) to gather application usage data...

In manual or automated testing, you will probably want to specify your own test settings when running tests. The test settings associated with the test plan will be used by default when you click Run button in Run Tests. There are two ways to create or edit a test settings associated with the test plan...

With MTM, we store our settings in your user profile. Specifically the ‘ Local App Data ’ section of your user profile. These are simple XML files that have your settings from MTM – window size/location, whether the Test Runner is docked or floating, the queries you’ve configured in Test Case Manager...

In a previous post , I briefly mentioned the back and forward buttons. Today I want to talk a bit more in depth about the issues we had in adding this common and seemingly simple concept to Microsoft Test and Lab Manager. Although the general behavior of back and forward does what one wants, it may not...

As this previous post explains, before Microsoft Test Manager, there was no real need to know which work items represent bugs or test cases. With VS2010, we introduced the concept of work item categories, which allows us to give a meaning to some of the general work item types we use in the product....