Continuing with our previous article, where we talked about our three software testing philosophy topics focused on what is quality, impact, and purpose of testing, it is time to continue about our software testing approach.

Approach

• • Testing is an intellectual process that requires critical, logical, and lateral thinking. Therefore, anything that discourages such thinking while performing such tests can potentially be harmful.
  • While testing, a tester must wear the hats of a detective, a scientist, and an explorer in order to ask the right questions that can expose the important information needed by the team and stakeholders.
  • There are no best practices, only good practices. Blindly applying the practice to a situation because it worked somewhere else, may cause more harm than good. Understanding the context of any practice in which it will be used is crucial.
  • No software is ever bug-free. Therefore, it is of the most important to find those bugs which are critical and important to the team, the stakeholders, and the audiences.
  • There is an enumerable number of scenarios which tests may contain, therefore one can never say that one has tested completely a product. The definition of done in testing must be carefully considered and agreed upon within the team and stakeholders
  • While all test approaches must be considered within its context, writing out fully detailed, explicitly defined test cases is most often NOT the best use of a testers time.
    Allowing the tester to variate his/her test execution without impacting the overall goals can introduce a larger probability to find those bugs which are most important.

Next week we will continue discussing our philosophy behind software testing where we will touch upon our philosophy behind the approach to software testing.

This article was written by Alex Dillon
CEO of TechAID
Twitter: @masterpiece91