Empowering Manual Testers to Automate
How do you get manual testers to be able to write their own automated tests for UI and functional testing? The key is to implement high-level language that testers can immediately recognize while keeping the messy details of Selenium and Python out of sight. Not only does this create tests that are implemented in the business language, but it also keeps those tests viable, even when application implementation details change. Tom Izard's team implemented a framework using Selenium, Python, UI navigation, application navigation, and business language, using only open source tools. He will show how this implementation works to empower testers to author their own automated tests, as well as how the framework was developed following its own agile path. Tom will also cover the politics of demonstrating to all roles in a company how automation can work for everyone’s benefit—including how to convince management to pay for and staff this effort in the face of tight budgets and overworked people.
Tom has been a professional software engineer for over 40 years after earning degrees in electrical engineering and computer science. With the exception of one year suffered in management, he has spent his career as a software developer. For the past dozen years, that development has been in the realm of test automation. He has tested embedded, Windows, mobile, and web applications, most of them life-critical. Starting with simple batch scripts, moving on to custom Python programs, and now working with full-on frameworks, Tom has often introduced automation to companies where none had existed. As an automation champion, Tom has spent significant time teaching all corporate levels about the joys of test automation.