Questions tagged [test-management]
Use for questions about managing the test process, including organizing test cases and test results.
574
questions
103
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17
answers
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Should a tester feel bad about finding too many defects/bugs in the product?
I work as a junior black box tester in a small software house. I work in a medical industry web application. I was assigned a module to test. I did a lot of research and risk analysis and logged at ...
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63
votes
17
answers
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How should a Software Tester deal with missed Defects/bugs in Production?
I work as a QA/test engineer in a small software company. It is an e-commerce based product. I was assigned a few projects by my manager. I mostly do functional/blackbox testing. Before the production ...
- 611
49
votes
16
answers
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Can a Manual Tester survive in software industry without learning Automation?
I mean to say is that if I dislike coding and don't understand complex code, then will I be able to survive as a QA. Or do I need to learn test automation to grow position and pay in my career, as I ...
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44
votes
12
answers
9k
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What should Testers do if they are not able to find good defects in the product?
I work as manual/black-box tester. My responsibility primarily includes functional testing of a web application and to some extent database testing using sql server, based on the functional ...
user15122
36
votes
9
answers
32k
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How to write a test plan
I am new to "Test Plan Writing" and I want to learn how to write test plan.
As a beginner, what do I need to understand and learn first to write quality/effective test plan?
What would you suggest?
- 1,412
34
votes
8
answers
6k
views
Who is responsible for pinpointing bugs?
Let's imagine this common situation: a tester creates an issue for a developer to fix, providing the steps to reproduce, screenshots and other details (if available). Then, a developer does not think ...
- 11.4k
33
votes
12
answers
8k
views
How to explain the concept of test automation to a team that only knows manual testing?
I have been working as a QA in our 9 developer team for about a year. Had lots of 'firsts' within the year between personal and professional life. I replaced a QA who only did manual testing and ...
- 1,357
28
votes
10
answers
7k
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Senior management expected bug discovery rate to match their expectation
We are four weeks in testing a new application. In summary
There is only one developer assigned to this project, basically, 8 man hour is available for this project.
The rate of bug discovery is ...
- 1,515
27
votes
8
answers
5k
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What should a Software Tester do to become more valuable and helpful for the Development Team?
When I write detailed defect descriptions or bug reports, then my team's Development manager feels satisfied. What are few things a blackbox tester can do to help the Developers become more productive ...
user15122
25
votes
15
answers
5k
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Should QA report bugs on features before they are fully implemented?
I am a developer and I generally check in partial implementations so that I don't have too much uncommited code at any time.
I make sure that the application compiles and that it does not interfere ...
- 351
25
votes
9
answers
28k
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Copying Production Data to a QA Environment
Many companies have a match of their production platform available in a QA environment, with the only difference being that the QA environment connects to QA datasources (which generally contain fake ...
- 351
25
votes
3
answers
3k
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What's the recommended practice for separating unit tests from integration tests for automated testing?
On a project I've been working on, we've been steadily increasing the code coverage through tests. Some of these tests were done as integration tests and some as unit tests. The integration tests can ...
- 352
24
votes
7
answers
4k
views
How can I be sure that rarely reproduced issue is fixed?
I have a bug that is rarely reproduced, in about 1 case out of 5 attempts (20% reproducibility). Developers made a new version with the fix. How many times do I need to run a test to be sure that the ...
- 475
24
votes
3
answers
3k
views
Good resources for building a QA team
Our corporation has, up until this point, largely lacked a 'quality mentality' of any kind. From no testers, they went to two testers - but 5 or 6 product teams still rely on a mix of developer and ...
- 5,400
23
votes
9
answers
5k
views
Should application and automated test languages match?
If an application is written in a certain language, e.g. Python, Ruby, Clojure, etc. should Quality Engineers use the same language to write the tests?
Should this be a decision that we can apply ...
- 331
23
votes
6
answers
10k
views
How to deal with flaky tests that have intermittent failures?
Having flaky tests that sometimes fail and sometimes pass is very frustrating:
there is no single reason each of the flaky tests fail
the failures don't seem to happen to real users using the ...
- 11.4k
20
votes
6
answers
6k
views
What would be the strategy when too many bugs are found in the final round of testing?
The QA team starts testing a software/product and there are “way too many” defects…!
Every other scenario is failing, new flows are explored & clarifications sought.
What would be the strategy now?...
- 6,785
19
votes
14
answers
4k
views
When is it OK not to have dedicated testers/QA team?
I noticed that there are no dedicated QAs in the stackexchange team.
Since they are indeed making an awesome product, I wonder: When is it possible to have an absence of dedicated quality assurance ...
- 1,166
18
votes
8
answers
5k
views
Asking UI developers to adjust markup to improve automated tests
From time to time when doing test automation, a locator for the desired element is either too complicated, fragile or not readable. In cases like this, we ask developers to add IDs or other data-...
- 11.4k
18
votes
12
answers
104k
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Looking for an excellent example of using a spreadsheet for test case management
It is an unfortunate reality of our industry that many testers are stuck using a spreadsheet to manage their test cases.
I wanted to ask (in a community wiki), what are some good techniques and ...
18
votes
1
answer
1k
views
Questions to ask when estimating testing effort?
I've been a software tester for a little more than a couple of years now and I'm looking to upgrade my skills for the role of Team Lead.
Team leaders and managers usually have to do the planning and ...
- 8,956
17
votes
5
answers
2k
views
How should I respond when the team wants to ignore a critical but hard to reproduce bug
I am a Test engineer in a company. Recently, I caught a special bug. Here is the bug description.
Process: Send money to a recipient via online banking. Fill in all the
required details and ...
- 271
17
votes
9
answers
6k
views
Gamification in software testing
Is there a place for gamification in software testing? Could it be made as a part of a regular testing process and could it have a positive impact on productivity and quality?
I've been thinking ...
- 11.4k
17
votes
6
answers
18k
views
How should a tester deal with a bug found in production?
In my previous project, I was working as a black-box/manual tester. My major responsibilities were performing function testing, executing regression suites, running smoke tests etc. I was testing a ...
user15122
17
votes
18
answers
38k
views
Alternatives to HP Quality Center for small business
Which are the alternatives today? Not only freeware, but tools affordable for a development team of 3-5 men.
I like the structure and flexibility of HP QC, so a similar tool would be nice to have.
17
votes
7
answers
13k
views
How can I structure Selenium tests in a way that minimizes the maintenance work?
What is the best way to build/structure the tests in a way that will minimize the work needed to keep the tests up to date as the product changes and improves?
- 171
16
votes
5
answers
1k
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How do you determine that your project's quality has increased over time?
Preface:
I know that the question may be a bit broad, so I hope it doesn't get closed. However, I feel this is a topic that a lot of QA engineers and managers struggle with and I don't think there's ...
- 501
16
votes
4
answers
317
views
What techniques are available to determine which browsers to test?
When websites being deployed to the internet are about to go live, the age old question always comes up. "Which browsers should I test?"
I am not asking that question because it will soon become ...
- 9,750
16
votes
5
answers
2k
views
Estimating a testing project
How do you estimate a testing project? What are the things to be take care of while estimating the time for a testing project ?
- 1,105
15
votes
7
answers
2k
views
The test team as an enemy of development? And how can this be avoided?
Details
Forming a Scrum team should include all the skills necessary to develop a user story in order to deliver a potentially deliverable product increment with each sprint.
In traditional ...
- 1,107
14
votes
10
answers
4k
views
What could a QA engineer do when a project is in an early stage?
Good day, beautiful and smart people!
We've been prototyping an application and it is more or less at the MVP stage and the customer, seeing the minimum desired functionality, is taking things ...
- 11.4k
14
votes
5
answers
4k
views
What to do when a bug is fixed, unfixed and fixed
A blocker bug I raised last week had been fixed and ready for re-testing.
This morning, I re-tested it, it passed and subsequently closed.
In the afternoon, by accident, I noticed this feature was ...
- 1,515
14
votes
3
answers
850
views
What are the challenges around the integration of Manual and Automated Tests?
This is more a request for your professional opinion than a question...
We are seeing how test automation is spreading to more and more organizations. This in itself is a good thing, but at the same ...
- 348
13
votes
6
answers
1k
views
Retest whole system or just changes with regression tests
After regression tests are done, bugs are filed and fixed. A new release build is made with bug fixes. Should you re-run regression tests again on new build or is it enough to do only re-testing of ...
- 229
13
votes
5
answers
376
views
Heuristics for identifying "one-time" tests?
I understand the importance of having good "regression tests" to ensure fixed bugs don't get reintroduced. But I think it's possible to go too far and end up with a massive "regression test suite" for ...
- 2,679
13
votes
6
answers
716
views
How to know if an existing set of automated tests are effective?
I came to a new project and it was already written 100 autotests. The product is new. How to determine whether the tests are effective? What is the best way?
- 475
13
votes
5
answers
3k
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Are Mind Maps useful as a testing tool?
I don’t know much about Mind maps but I’ve seen expert testers (James Bach and Michael Bolton) use them to plan out their test strategy – usually in a demonstration. It seems like a plausible way to ...
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13
votes
7
answers
11k
views
What test management tool to manage Cucumber tests?
In my company we have our tests specified in Gherkin (Cucumber), and we use Jenkins to schedule the execution of these tests.
We have the need of a management tool, where we can associate the tests ...
- 131
13
votes
2
answers
679
views
Maintaining automation framework for different browsers like IE and FF
How to maintain automation framework for different browsers like IE and FF?
In my current set up, I maintain two different configuration properties files, one with xpath locators that FF supports ...
- 1,105
13
votes
10
answers
3k
views
Test Case Management Software
I currently write automated tests using WebDriver/Selenium 2 and utilize the Page Object model. I'd like to start documenting manual tests but our current process is only creating test cases in MS ...
- 315
12
votes
12
answers
9k
views
How do I execute/test a large set of test cases with limited time and resources?
We have a large set of test cases but limited time and resources to execute/test them all. We thought but it's not possible to execute/test everything.
I want to know strategies which will be ...
- 1,835
12
votes
6
answers
36k
views
Test Suite vs. Test Plan
I am having a difficult time pinning down an official description of what a test suite is compared to a test plan.
In Test Computer Software they don't even mention suites. (I assume because the book ...
- 175
12
votes
7
answers
3k
views
How to deal with automated test cases that always fail?
I'm facing a lot of automated GUI tests that fail one or more verifications during their run. All the failings points have been reported in our tracking system and they are known issues but get "...
12
votes
4
answers
2k
views
How can I report coverage on an n-dimensional test matrix?
I have a test matrix for my product's installation, which is n-dimensional, where n is about 11 or 12 at this point. For instance, the OS is one dimension, and the DB is another, and the Reporting ...
- 1,203
12
votes
4
answers
7k
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Is there a guide for systematic way of writing test scenarios?
Are there best practices in coming up with effective test scenarios? Are there documented test scenarios that can be reused across different systems?
- 761
12
votes
4
answers
3k
views
Keeping automation code away from application source code
Disclaimer: this question is not related to - "Test cases in source code"
I am working on a super fast development environment where manual test cases were given no importance (thankfully things are ...
- 3,437
12
votes
1
answer
805
views
Tools for tracking automated tests
I have used STAF/STAX in the past, and liked the way that information was tracked in the tests.
I'm currently investigating Technologies to tie together a few tools that use XML-RPC, and am ...
- 649
11
votes
6
answers
3k
views
How to deal with or prevent idle in the test team?
I'm currently in two scrum projects. The team consists of 9 people (5 developers, 3 testers). We work with user stories, story point estimates and two-week sprints. The team has received a great deal ...
- 1,107
11
votes
3
answers
4k
views
What is Snapshot Testing?
I've recently stumbled upon this new (at least to me) testing type: Snapshot Testing:
For Facebook's native apps we use a system called “snapshot testing”: a snapshot test system that renders UI ...
- 11.4k
10
votes
2
answers
25k
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What is the difference between Software Test Engineer, Test Automation Engineer and Software Developer in Test (SDET)?
Software Test Engineer usualy performs “manual” testing (without spending time on automating and supporting the tests). Usually is responsible to find all (as more as possible) critical bugs in the ...
- 1,602