Software Developer

Tutorials

MA A Rapid Introduction to Rapid Software Testing

Michael Bolton, DevelopSense

Mon, 05/05/2014 - 8:30am

You're under tight time pressure and have barely enough information to proceed with testing. How do you test quickly and inexpensively, yet still produce informative, credible, and accountable results? Rapid Software Testing, adopted by context-driven testers worldwide, offers a field-proven answer to this all-too-common dilemma. In this one-day sampler of the approach, Michael Bolton introduces you to the skills and practice of Rapid Software Testing through stories, discussions, and "minds-on" exercises that simulate important aspects of real testing problems.

MB The Challenges of BIG Testing: Automation, Virtualization, Outsourcing, and More SOLD OUT

Hans Buwalda, LogiGear

Mon, 05/05/2014 - 8:30am

Large-scale and complex testing projects can stress the testing and automation practices we have learned through the years, resulting in less than optimal outcomes. However, a number of innovative ideas and concepts are emerging to better support industrial-strength testing for big projects. Hans Buwalda shares his experiences and strategies he's developed for organizing and managing testing on large projects. Learn how to design tests specifically for automation, including how to incorporate keyword testing and other techniques.

MD Hands On with Selenium and WebDriver NEW

Alan Richardson, Compendium Developments

Mon, 05/05/2014 - 8:30am

Selenium WebDriver is an open source automation tool for test driving browsers. People sometimes find the API daunting and their initial automation code brittle and poorly structured. In this introduction, Alan Richardson provides hints and tips gained from his years of experience both using WebDriver and helping others improve their use of the tool. Alan starts at the beginning, explaining the basic WebDriver API capabilities—simple interrogation and navigation—and then moves on to synchronization strategies and working with AJAX applications.

MG Take a Test Drive of Acceptance Test-Driven Development NEW

Jared Richardson, Agile Artisans

Mon, 05/05/2014 - 8:30am

The practice of agile software development requires a clear understanding of business needs. Misunderstanding requirements causes waste, slipped schedules, and mistrust within the organization. Jared Richardson shows how good acceptance tests can reduce misunderstanding of requirements. A testable requirement provides a single source that serves as the analysis document, acceptance criteria, regression test suite, and progress-tracker for any given feature. Jared explores the creation, evaluation, and use of testable requirements by the business and developers.

MJ Exploratory Testing Explained

Paul Holland, Testing Thoughts

Mon, 05/05/2014 - 8:30am

Exploratory testing is an approach to testing that emphasizes the freedom and responsibility of testers to continually optimize the value of their work. It is the process of three mutually supportive activities—learning, test design, and test execution—done in parallel. With skill and practice, exploratory testers typically uncover an order of magnitude more problems than when the same amount of effort is spent on procedurally scripted testing. All testers conduct exploratory testing in one way or another, but few know how to do it systematically to obtain the greatest benefits.

TE Innovation Thinking: Evolve and Expand Your Capabilities NEW

Jennifer Bonine, tap|QA, Inc.

Tue, 05/06/2014 - 8:30am

Innovation is a word tossed around frequently in organizations today. The standard clichés are Do more with less and Be creative. Companies want to be innovative but often struggle with how to define, implement, prioritize, and track their innovation efforts. Using the Innovation to Types model, Jennifer Bonine will help you transform your thinking regarding innovation and understand if your team and company goals match their innovation efforts. Learn how to classify your activities as "core" (to the business) or "context" (essential, but non-revenue generating).

TI Exploring Usability Testing NEW

Rob Sabourin, AmiBug.com

Tue, 05/06/2014 - 8:30am

It is not enough to verify that software conforms to requirements by passing established acceptance tests. Successful software products engage, entertain, and support the users' experience. Goals vary from project to project, but no matter how robust and reliable your software is, if your users do not embrace it, business can slip from your hands. Rob Sabourin shares how to elicit effective usability requirements with techniques such as story boarding and task analysis.

TM Security Testing for Testing Professionals

Jeff Payne, Coveros, Inc.

Tue, 05/06/2014 - 1:00pm

Today’s software applications are often security critical, making security testing an essential part of a software quality program. Unfortunately, most testers have not been taught how to effectively test the security of the software applications they validate. Join Jeff Payne as he shares what you need to know to integrate effective security testing into your everyday software testing activities. Learn how software vulnerabilities are introduced into code and exploited by hackers. Discover how to define and validate security requirements.

Keynotes

K2 Testing in the Age of Distraction: Flow, Focus, and Defocus in Testing

Zeger Van Hese, Z-sharp

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 10:00am

We live in interesting times. Knowledge is available at our fingertips, no matter where we are. Social networks enable communication around the world. However, along with these marvels of the information age come weapons of mass distraction. With so many things competing for our attention—and so little time to focus on real work—it’s a wonder we get anything done at all. What does this mean for testers? A common belief is that only focused concentration leads to productive work—and conversely, that distraction causes procrastination and stifles creativity.

K3 Lightning Strikes the Keynotes

Lee Copeland, Software Quality Engineering

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 4:15pm

Throughout the years, Lightning Talks have been a popular part of the STAR conferences. If you’re not familiar with the concept, Lightning Talks consists of a series of five-minute talks by different speakers within one presentation period. Lightning Talks are the opportunity for speakers to deliver their single biggest bang-for-the-buck idea in a rapid-fire presentation. And now, lightning has struck the STAR keynotes.

K4 Extreme Automation: Software Quality for the Next Generation Enterprise

Theresa Lanowitz, voke, inc.

Thu, 05/08/2014 - 8:30am

Software runs the business. The modern testing organization aspires to be a change agent and an inspiration for quality throughout the entire lifecycle. To be a change agent, the testing organization must have the right people and skill sets, the right processes in place to ensure proper governance, and the right technology to aid in the delivery of software in support of the business line. Traditionally, testing organizations have focused on the people and process aspect of solving quality issues.

K5 The Art of Testing Transformation: Blending Technology with Cutting-Edge Processes

Jennifer Bonine, tap|QA, Inc.

Thu, 05/08/2014 - 4:15pm

Technologies, testing processes, and the role of the tester have evolved significantly over the past several years. As testing professionals, it is critical that we evaluate and evolve ourselves to continue to add tangible value to our organizations. In your work, are you focused on the trivial or on real "game changers"? Jennifer Bonine describes critical elements that, like a skilled painter, help you artfully blend people, process, and technology into a masterpiece, woven together to create a synergistic relationship that adds value to your organization.

Concurrent Sessions

W2 Testing Lessons Learned from Monty Python

Rob Sabourin, AmiBug.com

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 11:30am

And now for something completely different. Monty Python's Flying Circus revolutionized comedy and brought zany British humor to a worldwide audience. However, buried deep in the hilarity and camouflaged in its twisted wit lie many important testing lessons—tips and techniques you can apply to real world problems to deal with turbulent projects, changing requirements, and stubborn project stakeholders.

W8 Continuous Testing through Service Virtualization

Allan Wagner, IBM

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 1:45pm

The demand to accelerate software delivery and for teams to continuously test and release high quality software sooner has never been greater. However, whether your release strategy is based on schedule or quality, the entire delivery process hits the wall when agility stops at testing. When software/services that are part of the delivered system or required environments are unavailable for testing, the entire team suffers. Al Wagner explains how to remove these testing interruptions, decrease project risk, and release higher quality software sooner.

W9 Leveraging Open Source Automation: A Selenium WebDriver Example

David Dang, Zenergy Technologies

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 1:45pm

As online activities create more revenue than ever, organizations are turning to Selenium both to test their web applications and to reduce costs. Since Selenium is open source, there is no licensing fee. However, as with purchased tools, the same automation challenges remain, and users do not have formal support and maintenance. Proper strategic planning and the use of advanced automation concepts are a must to ensure successful Selenium automation efforts.

W10 Risk-Based Testing for Agile Projects

Erik van Veenendaal, Improve Quality IT Services BV

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 1:45pm

Many projects implicitly use some kind of risk-based approach for prioritizing testing activities. However, critical testing decisions should be based on a product risk assessment process using key business drivers as its foundation. For agile projects, this assessment should be both thorough and lightweight. PRISMA (PRoduct RISk MAnagement) is a highly practical method for performing systematic product risk assessments. Learn how to employ PRISMA techniques in agile projects using risk-poker.

W11 Succeeding as an Ethnic or Minority Tester

Yousef Harfi, Medavie Blue Cross

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 1:45pm

No one wishes to see himself as different or treat other people differently because of his uniqueness. Unfortunately, we are frequently judged and our skills presumed based on our ethnicity, beliefs, politics, appearance, lifestyle, gender, or sexual orientation. Our professional success and our projects’ success can be derailed because of lack of understanding, stereotyping, or fear. Our professional environment includes us all―brown, black, white, tall, short, male, female, straight, gay, extroverts, and introverts.

W12 Improving the Mobile Application User Experience (UX)

Philip Lew, XBOSoft

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 1:45pm

If users can’t figure out how to use your mobile applications and what’s in it for them, they’re gone. Usability and UX are key factors in keeping users satisfied so understanding, measuring, testing and improving these factors are critical to the success of today’s mobile applications. However, sometimes these concepts can be confusing—not only differentiating them but also defining and understanding them. Philip Lew explores the meanings of usability and UX, discusses how they are related, and then examines their importance for today’s mobile applications.

W15 Implementing Testing for Behavior-Driven Development Using Cucumber

Max Saperstone, Coveros

Wed, 05/07/2014 - 3:00pm

With the behavior-driven development (BDD) methodology, development teams write high level, plain natural language tests to describe and exercise a system. Unfortunately, it is difficult to develop BDD tests that encompass all interfaces and write tests that can be reused in multiple scenarios. Specifying BDD tests to run as part of different test scenarios without duplicating work frequently requires substantial effort and rework. But Cucumber provides a robust framework for writing BDD tests.

T6 Using the Cloud to Load Test and Monitor Your Applications

Charles Sterling, Microsoft

Thu, 05/08/2014 - 9:45am

Load testing is often one of the most difficult testing efforts to set-up—in both time for the deployment and cost for the additional hardware needed. Using cloud-based software, you can transform this most difficult task to one of the easiest. Charles Sterling explains how load testing fits into the relatively new practice of DevOps. Then, by re-using the tests created in the load testing effort to monitor applications, the test team can help solve the challenges in measuring, monitoring, and diagnosing applications―not just in development and test but also into production.

T8 Designing for Testability: Differentiator in a Competitive Market

David Campbell, MITRE Corporation

Thu, 05/08/2014 - 11:15am

In today’s cost conscious marketplace, solution providers gain advantage over competitors when they deliver measurable benefits to customers and partners. Systems of even small scope often involve distributed hardware/software elements with varying execution parameters. Testing organizations often deal with a complex set of testing scenarios, increased risk for regression defects, and competing demands on limited system resources for a continuous comprehensive test program. Learn how designing a testable system architecture addresses these challenges.

T13 Top Challenges in Testing Requirements

Lloyd Roden, Lloyd Roden Consultancy

Thu, 05/08/2014 - 1:30pm

Studies show that at least half of all software defects are rooted in poor, ambiguous, or incomplete requirements. For decades, testing has complained about the lack of solid concrete requirements, claiming that this makes our task more difficult and in some instances—impossible. Lloyd Roden challenges these beliefs and explains why having detailed requirements can be at best damaging and at worst can even be harmful to both testing and the business.

T14 Build the Right Regression Suite with Behavior-Driven Testing

Anand Bagmar, ThoughtWorks

Thu, 05/08/2014 - 1:30pm

Manual functional testing is a slow, tedious, and error prone process. As we continue to incrementally build software, the corresponding regression test suite continues to grow. Rarely is time allotted to consolidate and keep these test cases in sync with the product under development. If these test cases are used as the basis for automation, the resulting suite is composed of very granular tests that are often quite brittle in nature.

T15 Designing and Implementing Automation at a Large Financial Institution

Michael Sowers, SQE

Thu, 05/08/2014 - 1:30pm

Planning, designing, implementing, and tracking results for QA and test automation can be challenging. It is vital to ensure that any tools selected will work well with other application lifecycle tools, driving the adoption of automation across multiple project teams or departments, and communicating the quantitative and qualitative benefits to key stakeholders. Mike Sowers discusses his experiences creating an automation architecture, establishing tool deployment plans, and selecting and reporting tool metrics at a large financial institution.