The future of the software testing
Harry Robinson predictions about the future of the software testing - http://www.stickyminds.com/sitewide.asp?Function=WEEKLYCOLUMN&ObjectId=6887
The model-based testing is picking up speed here at Microsoft. There is increased participations of the test teams early in the design phase of the products. There is lot of other “smart” test writing techniques being adopted. We have great internal tolls in development, that help us immensely with the automation of the product testing. However, although I do share some of Harry's expectations, I am not that optimistic about the testing future in the short term.
One big problem (and a big reason for my pessimism) is that lot of people don't look at the software testing as an engineering discipline. Most of the bright young people that come out of colleges use it as a step towards the “ultimate” goal of becomming a “true” developers. In two or three years they move on to the other side of the fence, taking with them all the experience and knowledge they gathered during the development of the automated tests, leaving all the code base to somebody as bright and entusiastic and as equally unexperienced as they were when they started this job. And since that code base was also used as a platform for learning tips, tricks, useful techniques and experimenting with various ideas, it usually is a typical example of “spaghetti” code. (Good luck maintaining a 10 year old test owned by 5 different people and without good documentation)
So, what are your predictions for the future of the software testing?
