Gaining Hands-On Experience

Software testing is just like most other computer topicsyou can read about it all day, but until you actually try the things you've read about, it's difficult to comprehend. For this reason, one of the best ways to learn software testing is to try it yourself, on your own computer with your own software.

Choose a program you're familiar with and enjoy using or one that you've never used before. Read the manual and the help files as though they were the product specification. Put together a test plan, design the test cases, and look for bugs. Use a spreadsheet or word processor to log them and report what you find to the software company that wrote the application (almost all software companies have a means for reporting problems, usually through their websites). You'll be surprised what you find, and maybe the company will, too.

With a little experience at this type of testing, you could sign up to be a beta tester for new software products. As you learned in Chapter 16, "Bug Bashes and Beta Testing," beta testers receive copies of the software before the general public does. You'll have an opportunity to see and use software that's not quite finished, find bugs that were missed by the company's internal software testers, and, based on what you find, possibly have an impact on the product's design. Every software company has its own system for administering beta tests. Search their websites for "beta tester" or call them and ask to talk with someone about becoming a beta tester. You won't make a career out of beta testing but you can learn a great deal.

NOTE

Be careful if you use beta software on your home or work PC. By its nature, beta software isn't ready for public release and is full of bugs. Some of those bugs can cause serious problems with your computer and existing software, including frequent crashes and loss of data. Make backups of anything important before you run beta software.

Becoming a usability test subject (see Chapter 11, "Usability Testing") is another way to gain some hands-on experience at software testing. Most large software companies making personal computer software have usability labs or contract out to independent usability labs in their area. If you're interested in testing user interfaces, make some phone calls and inquire about becoming a subject for software usability testing. Often you'll be asked to fill out a form to measure your experience and familiarity with certain types of software. As projects go to usability testing, your profile will be reviewed to see if you're the type of person they're looking for; depending on the product being tested, they may need absolute beginners all the way to experts. If you're a match, you'll be called in to try out features in a new product or even a prototype of a new product. The people administering the test will watch what you do, record your actions, and observe how you react to the software. They may invite you back to try out changes they make based on your findings and you'll often be compensated for your timeusually with free software.

You can also find bugs for cash by becoming a bug bounty hunter. The Mozilla Foundation, the support organization for the Mozilla open-source software project, has a security bug bounty program. If you find a valid critical security bug in the Mozilla Suite, Firefox browser, or Thunderbird email client, they will pay you $500 cash and give you a Mozilla T-shirt. This would be a great way to hone your testing skills and make yourself known in the software testing community. You can find more details about their program at www.mozilla.org/security/bug-bounty.html.

A good starting point for learning about open source testing and testing tools is www.opensourcetesting.org. Here you'll find numerous tools, news, and articles related to open source testing as well as links to other open source testing sites. You won't get paid a bounty, but gaining hands-on experience with tools being used by your peers and being able to network with others using them would be invaluable.