SQA, Become a good Tester

Do you know what Software Quality Assurance is??

It consists of the software engineering processes and methods used to ensure quality. SQA encompasses the entire software development process, which may include processes such as reviewing requirements documents, source code control, code reviews, change management, configuration management, release management and of course, software testing.

Software quality assurance is related to the practice of quality assurance in product manufacturing. There are, however, some notable differences between software and a manufactured product. These differences all stem from the fact that the manufactured product is physical and can be seen whereas the software product is not visible. Therefore its function, benefit and costs are not as easily measured.

(Source www.wikipedia.org)

How to become a good Tester

Sometimes we tend to play the role of being the Quality Police. We enforce quality standards, identify programmers who are not following procedures, and sometimes go to a personal level to accuse programmers whom we feel are producing inferior work. This role traps us into being less effective as testers. And it’s more likely to undermine the project by discouraging communication, reducing trust, and causing delays.

A software tester’s job is to test software, find bugs, and report them so that they can be fixed. An effective software tester focuses on the software product itself and gathers empirical information regarding what it does and doesn’t do. This is a big job all by itself. The challenge is to provide accurate, comprehensive, and timely information, so managers can make informed decisions.

However, many testers take on additional “responsibilities.” They criticise programmers for shoddy work or for not following proper procedures. Or they try to mandate how programmers should operate. Or they snipe at the design instead of finding bugs. These testers may refuse to test builds that don’t have sufficient documentation or refuse to research bugs that shouldn’t have been there in the first place. They think that programmers require discipline and are determined to give it to them.

Some testers adopt the attitudes of the quality police on their own initiative. Others do so at the prompting of their managers or the advice of authors and consultants. Let’s look at some of the beliefs that can lead to trouble.

So let's not try to get personal but do our job in the most effective way.


(Extracts from www.stickyminds.com)