Project Management

Tutorials

Rob Sabourin, AmiBug.com

Tue, 06/23/2015 - 8:30am

Anyone who has ever attempted to estimate software testing effort realizes just how difficult the task is. The number of factors that can affect the estimate is virtually unlimited. The key to good estimates is to understand the primary variables, compare them to known standards, and normalize the estimates based on their differences. This is easy to say but difficult to accomplish because estimates are frequently required even when very little is known about the project—and what is known is constantly changing. Throw in a healthy dose of politics and a bit of wishful thinking, and estimation can become a nightmare. Rob Sabourin provides a foundation for anyone who must estimate software testing work effort. Learn about the test team’s and tester’s roles in estimation and measurement, and how to estimate in the face of uncertainty. Analysts, developers, leads, test managers, testers, and QA personnel can all benefit from this tutorial.

TI Measurement and Metrics for Test Managers

Rick Craig, Software Quality Engineering

Tue, 06/23/2015 - 1:00pm

To be most effective, test managers must develop and use metrics to help direct the testing effort and make informed recommendations about the software’s release readiness and associated risks. Because one important testing activity is to “measure” the quality of the software, test managers must measure the results of both the development and testing processes. Collecting, analyzing, and using metrics is complicated because many developers and testers are concerned that the metrics will be used against them. Join Rick Craig as he addresses common metrics—measures of product quality, defect removal efficiency, defect density, defect arrival rate, and testing status. Learn the guidelines for developing a test measurement program, rules of thumb for collecting data, and ways to avoid “metrics dysfunction.” Rick identifies several metrics paradigms and discusses the pros and cons of each. Delegates are urged to bring their metrics problems and issues for use as discussion points.

Keynotes

K1 How We NOW Test Software at Microsoft

Alan Page, Microsoft

Wed, 06/24/2015 - 8:30am

In December 2008 when How We Test Software at Microsoft was first published, the software community appreciated the insight into many testing activities and processes popular at Microsoft. Six and a half years later, many companies—including Microsoft—have evolved and changed in a variety of ways, and now much of the book is outdated or obsolete. New products, new ideas, and new strategies for releasing software have emerged. Alan Page explores Microsoft’s current approaches to software testing and quality. He digs into new practices, describes changing roles, rants about long-lived ideas kicked to the curb in the past seven years―and might even share a few tidbits not fit for print and wide-scale distribution. To give organizations food for thought and ideas for growth, Alan reveals what’s new in quality approaches, developer to tester ratios, agile practices, tools, tester responsibilities—and lessons he’s learned along the way.

K3 Build the Right Product Right: Transitioning Test from Critiquing to Defining

Gerard Meszaros, FeedXL.com

Thu, 06/25/2015 - 8:30am

Do you find yourself with limited influence over what gets shipped on products you test? Is your report card on product quality often ignored? Do you think you can contribute more? Join Gerard Meszaros as he describes ways to transition from approaching quality with brute force testing to an enlightened and strategic perspective that will have real impact on product quality. Instead of criticizing the product, become an integral part of the development process and learn how you can help define what should be built. Gerard explores design for testability concepts and describes key testability requirements that will afford better, more efficient testing. He explains test design techniques that describe software functionality in layers of plain language tests. Gerard shows how a collaborative approach for building the right product results in much better outcomes from both quality and schedule perspectives. Stop rushing through multiple test-and-fix cycles that result in a less than quality product. Be part of the solution!

K4 The Next Decade of Agile Software Development and Test

J.B. Rainsberger, JBRAINS.CA

Thu, 06/25/2015 - 2:45pm

After almost fifteen years of history with agile practices, J.B. Rainsberger sees some alarming trends in our attitudes, practices, and even what we teach about agile. At the same time, he sees some progress in approaches and technologies—e.g., behavior-driven development, naked planning, and continuous delivery. Sadly, we still have maturity models, complicated process checklists, and unnecessary certification schemes. In the coming decade, unless we begin to focus on fundamental ingredients absent from many agile teams, J.B. fears we are doomed to miss many opportunities for getting better. It's not good enough anymore just to be a great agile tester. J.B. says testers, programmers, product analysts, and managers must encourage workplace transformations so we can take full advantage of new tools and techniques. He shares a vision of these transformations and calls on testers and test managers, who work with all stakeholder groups, to stand up and lead us into the next decade of agile.

Concurrent Sessions

W3 From Formal Test Cases to Session-Based Exploratory Testing

Ron Smith, Intuit

Wed, 06/24/2015 - 10:15am

Agile software development is exciting, but what happens when your team is entrenched in older methodologies? Even with support from the organization, it is challenging to lead an organization through the transformation. As you start making smaller, more frequent releases, your manual test cases may not keep up, and your automated tests may not yet be robust enough to fill the gap. Add in the reality of shrinking testing resources, and it is obvious that change is required. But how and what should you change? Learn how Ron Smith and his team tackled these challenges by moving from a test case-driven approach to predominantly session-based exploratory testing, supported by “just enough” documentation. Discover how this resulted in testers who are more engaged, developers who increased their ability and willingness to test, and managers who increased their understanding and insight into the product. Use what you learn from Ron to begin the transformation in your organization.

W4 Testing Mobile App Performance

Brad Stoner, Neotys

Wed, 06/24/2015 - 10:15am

The mix of ever-smarter mobile devices and the constant connectivity of wireless networks have changed the way users access applications—and the way we develop and test them. Deployed applications deliver different content and functionality depending on whether the user is accessing them via a browser, smartphone, or tablet. And applications are accessed over myriad network configurations, including wireless and mobile networks. Brad Stoner presents an in-depth look at performance testing challenges for mobile applications including recording from devices, playing back device-specific requests, and accounting for variances in users’ geographical locations. Discover some of the best mobile performance testing approaches such as emulating mobile networks with varying connection speeds, packet loss, and latency during load tests. Find out when to use real devices vs. emulators to ensure high mobile application performance delivery to all end-users, at all times—on any device or network.

W9 The Tester’s Role in Agile Planning

Rob Sabourin, AmiBug.com

Wed, 06/24/2015 - 1:30pm

All too often testers passively participate in agile planning. And the results? Important testing activities are missed, late testing becomes a bottleneck, and the benefits of agile development quickly diminish. However, testers can actively advocate customer concerns while helping to implement robust solutions. Rob Sabourin shows how testers contribute to estimation, task definition, and scoping work required to implement user stories. Testers apply their elicitation skills to understand what users need, exploring typical, alternate, and error scenarios. Testers can anticipate cross story interference and the impact of new stories on legacy functionality. Rob discusses examples of how to break agile stories into test-related tasks. He shares experiences of transforming agile testers from passive planning participants into dynamic advocates of effective trade-offs, addressing the product owners’ critical business concerns, the teams’ limited resources, and the software projects’ technical risks. Join Rob to explore test infrastructure, test data, non-functional attributes, privacy, security, robustness, exploration, regression, business rules, and more.

T4 Root Cause Analysis for Testers

Jan van Moll, Philips Healthcare

Thu, 06/25/2015 - 10:15am

Bad product quality can haunt companies long after the product’s release. And root cause analysis (RCA) of product failures is an indispensable step in preventing its recurrence. Unfortunately, the testing industry struggles with doing proper RCA. Moreover, companies often fail to unlock the full potential of RCA by not including testers in the process. Failing to recognize the real value testers bring to RCA is a process failure. Another failure is not recognizing how extremely valuable RCA results are for devising enhanced test strategies. Using real-life—and often embarrassing—examples, Jan van Moll illustrates the added value that testers bring and discusses the pitfalls of RCA. Jan challenges testers and managers to analyze and rethink their own RCA practices. Learn how to increase your value as a professional tester to your business by performing powerful RCA—and avoiding its pitfalls.

T8 Become an Influential Tester: Learn How to Be Heard

Jane Fraser, Anki, Inc.

Thu, 06/25/2015 - 11:30am

As a tester, are you frustrated that no one listens to you? Are you finding bugs and having them ignored? Are you worried that the development process and product quality aren’t as good as they should be? Jane Fraser shares ways to help you be heard―ways to position yourself as a leader within your organization, ways to increase your influence, and ways to report bugs to get them fixed. In this interactive session, Jane leads you to a better understanding of how to be heard in your organization. Learn how to tailor your defect reports depending on who makes the decisions and their area of focus—customer, budget, or design. These details help you determine how to position your defect for action. Through real life examples, Jane shows you how to become a more influential tester.

T10 The Power of Pair Testing

Kirk Lee, Infusionsoft

Thu, 06/25/2015 - 1:30pm

Perhaps you have heard of pair testing but are unaware of its tremendous benefits. Maybe you have tried pair testing in the past but were dissatisfied with the result. When done correctly, pair testing significantly increases quality, decreases overhead, and improves the relationship between testers and developers. Join Kirk Lee as he shares the essential points of this powerful technique that moves testing upstream and prevents defects from being committed to the codebase. Kirk explores how pair testing facilitates discussion, increases test effectiveness, promotes partnership, and provides cross training. Learn why testers and developers say they love pair testing. Kirk describes key tips to ensure success, including the amount of time required for the pair-testing session, the best way to run the session, and how to know when the session is complete. He provides specific steps to take before, during, and after the pair-testing session to make it even more effective.