Reflections on 20 Years of Testing: Adapting and Optimising Practices

In my testing career, I’ve witnessed significant changes over the past 20 years. However, certain constants remain: the pursuit of working smarter, managing risks efficiently, and optimising testing efforts. We strive to test faster while minimising costs to stay competitive in the market. Flexible testing tasks allow us to adapt to changing schedules.

Additionally, creating knowledge documents, conducting peer reviews, and asking critical questions contribute to effective testing. This blog will explore insights from my testing journey, emphasising three key areas: what, when, and why. The “what,” "when,” and “why” drive out what goes into the category of doing the right thing, but the three are inextricably linked, and I expand on these below.

Introduction

Hi, I’m Jane Kelly, I have worked in the IT industry focusing mostly as a manual test analyst and consultant. I've embodied various roles akin to the many hats worn by a manual tester, adapting to the evolving needs of each project.

One of the critical roles within a project involves reviewing and analysing requirements and other documents. This process includes breaking them down, designing, and writing test cases or scenarios that can be executed in a test environment to demonstrate whether the requirements have been met. This is the first area where a tester, can help a project reduce costs, by identifying poorly written, ambiguous, or misleading requirements.

A Closer Look at Testing Lifecycle and Key Terms

Hello fellow LinkedIn readers and welcome to thoughts of the day. As a child, I would often engage in word puzzles, anagrams and then later learning testing material we used mnemonics to remember things.

As a spin off at my tea-break, I wrote down the word ‘testing’ and reeled off some key terms that feature heavily in testing. All for some light-hearted reading based upon my many experiences over the years.

From the Inside Out - Measuring Software Test Success 

Welcome to my blog about measuring the success of software testing. This is an important topic because it directly puts cost benefit analysis under the spotlight. Cost control is at the forefront of everything we do, so spending needs to be closely managed and justified.

The sub-header, ‘From The Inside Out’, is written from inside the delivery lifecycle and from more than two decades of testing experience, observations and perspective of a Test Consultant.

How to Utilise Impact Analysis & Dependency for Maximum Benefit

Hello everyone, I wanted to share a few musings around prioritisation, impact analysis and dependency in testing. This topic is of great interest to me because it affects so much of our lives, we do it naturally with varying success; depending upon our core values and many other variables. These includes aspirations, age, upbringing, genetics, level of responsibilities, consequences and experience. We are all consumers and users subconsciously testing the products available on the market, prioritising those which are important to us and our perception of how much value is to be received in using those carefully selected products.

Introduction to Test Automation in Software Testing

As we rapidly approach the new spring season with vigour, there is never a better time to revisit areas in our work/home lives and look at applying a fresh approach to make improvements.

The same can be said for software testing and exploring fresh ways of being innovative in the use of processes, tools and methodologies applied. The new financial year can bring new opportunities to invest in improvement initiatives and the spring season can often give rise to renewed energy, open mindsets, renewed commitment to try and apply new strategies and look to reduce none value-add activities.

Recently, I’ve been reflecting upon the evolving software testing role. Here are my reflections, some of which may be present in your organisation.

The Role Definition

Historically, the role was defined as a ‘Tester’ or a ‘Test Analyst/Software Test Analyst.’ In recent years, it’s changed to ‘Software Engineer.’ The role has evolved along with technology and now requires a degree of programming knowledge. The original remit was fairly set and involved reading, questioning, analysing and lots of manual keying. Current day requires automation skills for data creation, performance testing, use of API automation and generic regression test execution.

The Essential Guide to DevOps Process Flow

The words DevOps Process Flow refers to the continuous momentum achieved using the blended functional pipeline activity performed by a dynamic team. The team will typically be made up of solution architects, programmers and testers, plus other key roles. There are of course distinct activities which drive any substantial delivery. There are 8 core stages to a successful DevOps.

Understanding Software Testing Goals

Welcome! Today, I am going to blog about the things to consider when setting up software testing as a framework within an organisation with no existing test capability. Read on, to learn more…

A great starting point is the who, why, where, what and when approach. These things will enable you to create a plan about how you begin and what else you need!

Types of Software Testing - a Glossary

It's amusing that software testing is a conversation starter or stopper at a party when you exchange details on what you do for a living during first greetings, depending upon whether you meet a fellow ‘techie’ or not! Software testing doesn't have to be daunting; it can be fun and interesting!