Chapter 6: The Test Inventory

Overview

"Using a list (posted on the refrigerator) reduced my grocery bill by 23 percent In addition, I haven't run out of anything important since I started using it, which means no emergency runs to the grocery store. Finally, everyone in the house is much happier because the things that they want are here too."

Marnie L. Hutcheson

In this chapter I talk about methods for answering the questions "What are you going to test?", "What did you test?", and perhaps more importantly, "How big is it?"-because that is the question that gets asked the most. The auditors ask the first two questions; management asks the third. You can't get budget without a good answer to the question, "How big is it?"

The test inventory is a major component of a successful test effort. In this chapter, I introduce the test inventory and discuss how an inventory is used in preparing an estimate for a test effort and what types of items go in the test inventory. We'll also look at how the test inventory helps you conduct an adequate test effort and how it answers the question about how big it is. This process is continued through the next chapters.

Project management uses task lists to keep track of things that need doing. Test scripts are similar to tasks, but the two are not quite the same. The biggest difference is that whereas a task gets completed once, a test may be repeated many times. And this fact means that testing can be trickier to manage than a standard project.



Software Testing Fundamentals
Software Testing Fundamentals: Methods and Metrics
ISBN: 047143020X
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2005
Pages: 132

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