Software Testing - Revision history

BobJonkman: Moved Resources to Meeting Notes

2019-04-28T03:10:33Z

Moved Resources to Meeting Notes

BobJonkman: Removed meeting notes, added to its own page

2019-04-28T01:51:56Z

Removed meeting notes, added to its own page

Show changes

NicholasCollins at 01:35, 11 April 2019

2019-04-11T01:35:35Z

BobJonkman: Final meeting notes

2019-04-09T01:11:25Z

Final meeting notes

BobJonkman: Still more meeting notes

2019-04-09T00:17:48Z

Still more meeting notes

BobJonkman: More meeting notes

2019-04-08T23:49:55Z

More meeting notes

BobJonkman: Added meeting notes

2019-04-08T23:31:09Z

Added meeting notes

BobJonkman: Removed template links

2019-03-26T07:32:44Z

Removed template links

MarcPare: I have added the Meetup page; added Nick's blurb as per email exchange. -- Marc

2019-03-26T02:44:48Z

I have added the Meetup page; added Nick's blurb as per email exchange. -- Marc

BobJonkman: Add link for TechSoup Catalogue

2019-03-25T09:38:29Z

Add link for TechSoup Catalogue

@@ Line 16: / Line 16: @@
 * [[Software Testing/Meeting Notes 2019-04-08]]
 [[Category:NPSA]]
 [[Category:Events]]

← Older revision		Revision as of 01:35, 11 April 2019
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	[https://www.techsoupcanada.ca/en/directory/334 TechSoup Canada catalogue: Developer Software]		[https://www.techsoupcanada.ca/en/directory/334 TechSoup Canada catalogue: Developer Software]

		+
		+	[https://obsproject.com/ OBS Project] - software that is good for capturing videos of tests including drop menus
		+
		+
		+	One of James Bach's [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILkT_HV9DVU talks on YouTube]

	==== Meeting Notes ====		==== Meeting Notes ====

← Older revision		Revision as of 01:11, 9 April 2019
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	** Hitting a system with a large number of transactions, &c.		** Hitting a system with a large number of transactions, &c.
	** But a bogged down system may not be writing to logs, making analysis difficult		** But a bogged down system may not be writing to logs, making analysis difficult
		+	** A benefit in load testing is adding assertions, find issues with threads
		+	*** Assertions and Singletons...
		+	** Be sure to validate the output even when just testing for capacity


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		+	* Q: Do you use debugger software like GDB to examine the flow of code?
		+	* A: Not common, but becoming more prevalent.
		+	** Certainly having a debugger to throw at the code is nice to have
		+	** But much testing is done with the software under test as a black box, just examine the input and the expected output


		+	* Nick speaks of the complexity of software testing.
		+	** One thing works fine by itself, and other thing does too, but do they work together?
		+	** Different software on different platform needs to interoperate, but sometimes differences in date formats causes problems
		+	*** although each platform by itself passed all tests
		+	** Dealing with currencies, eg. USD and CAD, and GBP
		+	** Dealing with leap years and 29 February
		+	** General rule: Anything date sensitive needs to test for leap years
		+	*** and time zones! Anything dealing with calendars needs to worry about time zones


		+	* What happens internationally when different countries need to interoperate?
		+	** Companies have service contracts that define how the service is implemented
		+	*** If the system is changed, the contract defines who is responsible for continued interoperation
		+	*** If I make a change and it breaks your system, it's your fault for not defining the contract accurately
		+	*** called "spring contracts"


		+	* Nick gives an example from James ---- YouTube video ("nominal input voltage is 100VAC to 250VAC")
		+	** "Test the nominal range" is an incomplete answer
		+	** Also need to test outside the range
		+	** The user manual may give advice not to go outside the nominal range, but users don't necessarily read the manual
		+	** So, does the system fail gracefully outside the nominal range?
		+	** This is the function of the software tester, to design the test to ensure that software or equipment is failsafe
		+	*** eg. for medical equipment
		+	*** How much money is available to fry the device under test? Some prototypes may be '''really''' expensive
		+	*** Many examples of people damaging electronics with incorrect application of voltage!
		+	** It's good for testers to think outside the parameters of the system

		+
		+	* Testing to ensure system has a consistent look and feel
		+	** eg. fonts on some menus were different
		+	*** Is that a software testers responsibility? Sometimes as an additional task
		+	*** There are tools (overlays, templates) to find these issues
		+	** Window resizing can make the application fail, but there need to be limits for those tests
		+	** Testing for "greyed out" functions can be time consuming
		+	*** When a function is available when it shouldn't be can result in errors
		+	** These are general things for a tester to keep in mind
		+
		+
		+	* Systems that have features which have little to do with each other
		+	** Easy to test they're not contending for resources, &c.
		+	** But still important to run these features simultaneous to shake loose bugs, eg. memory allocation, concurrent DB access
		+	** Perhaps a simple monitor with limited functions: But what if something goes wrong, does the device report an error?
		+
		+
		+	* Client-side data validation: All testing needs to be duplicated at the server to ensure malusers don't bypass client-side validation
		+	** But that increases load on the server
		+
		+
		+	* Logging
		+	** Logs may indicate problems with the way the code executes, eg. repeated log entries indicate an invalid loop
		+	** Circular reasoning: How can the logs from software under test be considered
		+	*** Logs are only one step, begin the process of analysis
		+	*** NewRelic will test user experience (surveillance software)
		+
		+
		+	* Nick has found bugs because the test suites are well designed
		+	** But at least half the time the bugs discovered were found in spite of the test, which was not designed to find that kind of bug
		+
		+
		+	* Q&A
		+	** Is the developer + tester model usable?
		+	*** May be a bit scary for shops not set up for that collaborative arrangement
		+	** Nick says to just forge ahead.
		+	*** Having experience is good, but can also develop that experience in-house
		+	** Worries about the coming requirements for accessibility for software
		+	*** May take changes in coding practices (use POSH: Plain Ol' Semantic HTML instead of Javascripted forms)
		+	*** Jurisdictional differences may be difficult to deal with

@@ Line 24: / Line 24: @@
 ==== Meeting Notes ====
 * Introductions
 * Nicholas Collins
@@ Line 52: / Line 53: @@
 * Project Managers take different approaches
 **
 * '''You can always think of more tests'''
@@ Line 65: / Line 67: @@
 ** Nicholas has experience with sticky problems, gets ideas from texts to adapt to his problem
-* Party talk: Softare tester does not lead to stimulating conversation
 ** YouTube presenter on software testing is not dull!  (**********Need link!***********)

← Older revision		Revision as of 23:49, 8 April 2019
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	*** but Fanshawe college in London has a certificate program		*** but Fanshawe college in London has a certificate program
	** Some institutions have a couple of courses in tech writing, project management, quality management; maybe a night course in software quality testing		** Some institutions have a couple of courses in tech writing, project management, quality management; maybe a night course in software quality testing
		+	** Without academic rigour, different people use different terminology, nomenclature
		+	*** "Should I know what all these different terms mean?" But it's fairly common with other software testers Nick has spoken to
		+	** At Microsoft, developers use their development skills to write tests. Needs more skills than just coding
		+	*** Microsoft has internal courses to train testers how to test software
		+	*** Get promoted to full developer once you've proven you can write tests
		+	** people use Terminology like "Post-mortem" (although nobody dies), mix up "Milestone" and "Benchmark", &c.
		+	** Software testing is the start for a developer's career, then to DevOps
		+	*** Does this mean the most junior, inexperienced programmers are responsible for testing software?
		+	** Nick: large companies use junior testers to run tests, senior testers to supervise
		+	** During an upgrade Nick (a programmer at the time) did testing for the Database Analyst
		+	*** But a junior intern was assigned to that role as well, just to gain experience.
		+	*** Worked out details at a high level, then applied tests to get results
		+
		+
		+	* Project Managers take different approaches
		+	**
		+
		+	* '''You can always think of more tests'''
		+	** It's a fine balance between staying on schedule and being thorough
		+	** Walkthroughs and working in a team can be helpful
		+
		+
		+	* Some testing instructors do not like teaching from texts
		+	** eg. "Software Testing" by Yogesh Singh
		+	** But Nicholas gets good ideas from texts, doesn't agree with those testing instructors
		+	** THe problem is that the authors suffer from "Perfect Worldism"
		+	*** A world where there is unlimited time and money, and the perfect tests can be developed
		+	** Nicholas has experience with sticky problems, gets ideas from texts to adapt to his problem
		+
		+	* Party talk: Softare tester does not lead to stimulating conversation
		+	YouTube presenter on software testing is not dull! (******Need link!*********)
		+
		+
		+
		+
		+
		+

@@ Line 2: / Line 2: @@
 <!-- Entity for colon needed so it's not interpreted as <dt> by wiki -->
 ; Date: Monday, 8 April 2019 Year from 7&#x3A;00pm to 9&#x3A;00pm <!-- {{ical|url= xxxxx-Meetup-iCAL-URL /ical/topic.ics }} -->
-; Meetup Event: xxxxx URL to meetup.com
+; Meetup Event: https://www.meetup.com/NetSquared-Kitchener-Waterloo/events/260073069/
 ; Location: Room 1300 -- Conrad Grebel University College, 140 Westmount Rd. N., Waterloo, Ontario {{map|url=https://osm.org/go/ZXnbg2DSE--?m=}}
 <!-- ; Event Announcement: [[xxxxx Page Name/Announcement xxxxx YYYY-MM-DD]] --> <!-- URL for the announcement message sent a few days before the meeting -->
-Does your Non-Profit Organization use software? Does it work the way your staff expects? The way your clients expect? How can you be sure? Do you write in-house software? Does '''that''' work the way you expect? How do you know? Do you have separate Development and Testing and Staging and Production environments? How do you test software, anyway?
+If you work in software development, how much of your job involves testing? If you're a project manager, do you work closely with the testers to keep an eye on their results and bug reports as a project progresses? If you are a developer, do you do your own unit testing and work with testers on test plan reviews and fix the bugs they find when they do integration and regression testing? If you are a software tester, how do you balance the need to be thorough with the need to deliver on time? How does that affect writing test plans? When a project team has to deal with a lot of changes in the middle of development and testing, how do you cope with updating test plans with limited time? Since you should be considerate when reporting bugs in software, especially when people have worked hard on it, how can you do this tactfully? How do testers work with people like technical writers who use test plans as a reference when writing documentation like user manuals?
 Nicholas Collins, a long-time member of KWNSPA and a professional software tester will give us an overview of the deep art of testing software.

← Older revision		Revision as of 09:38, 25 March 2019
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	==== Resources ==== <!-- move to Meeting Notes after the session is held -->		==== Resources ==== <!-- move to Meeting Notes after the session is held -->
		+
		+	[https://www.techsoupcanada.ca/en/directory/334 TechSoup Canada catalogue: Developer Software]
	[http://example.com/link Link Text]		[http://example.com/link Link Text]