NVP Software Solutions

Tag: Process Improvement

  • Register this week for the October events at TASSQ and KWSQA

    Last chance to register for TASSQ and KWSQA

       

    NVP is at StarCanada Wednesday and Thursday this week. Stop at our booth for your free stress relieving bug.

       

    If you are in the Greater Toronto Area or Kitchener-Waterloo you might want to consider these events to network with other QA people or learn some of the new ideas in QA.

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    NVP Software Solutions will be participating in the following software testing and quality assurance events happening this September in Ontario, Canada. The events are located in Toronto and Kitchener-Waterloo in the coming weeks. Check out the relevant websites for more information and to register. This is a great opportunity to connect with other software testing and quality assurance professionals. We hope to see you there!


    Photo by Antenna on Unsplash




    THE POWER OF DESIGN SPRINTS FOR PRODUCT TEAM

     October 29, 2019 6:00 p.m.  The Albany Club – 91 King Street East, Toronto, Ontario

    Presenters:  Leah Oliveira and Carlos Oliveira

    Reality Driven Testing

     October 30, 2019 11:30 a.m.   University of Waterloo

    Presenters:  Rob Sabourin 

  • Trend Analysis on Defects – Part 2

    Last week we discussed some prerequisites for Trend Analysis on defects. We are only discussing defects here but there are many other project metrics that could be analysed.

    Assuming that the prerequisites from the previous blog have been satisfied, what can we determine.

    1. The trend in the number of defects in each project (after normalization by some project size measurement).
    2. The trend in the number of defects in each Priority and Severity level (again after normalization).
    3. The phase or process that consistently generates the most defects.
    4. Any weak or defect prone supplier processes.
    5. Any product weaknesses that cause consistent customer complaints.

    Once we have the information listed above, we are in a strong position to fix any weak areas and correct any issues that may be costing us customers or internal funds. This is process improvement devoted to making sure that our internal processes are the best possible and we are generating the best possible product. There is more to trend analysis than we are mentioning here, but there are entire books and conferences devoted to this topic. We have only touched the surface of one item we can measure, address and improve.

    October is Quality Month. Sign up for our newsletter, coming out next week, to see some things about Quality Month.

    Photo by Stephan Henning on Unsplash

  • Trend analysis on Defects – Part 1

    One of the items that is missed frequently in most organisations is Trend Analysis on Defects. This is the trend over time and over multiple projects. We are looking for whether things are improving or not as the case may be, over time. There are a number of prerequisites which we will discuss today prior to returning to this topic in a couple of weeks with further information.

    Prerequisites

    1. A consistent method of classifying defects with regard to Priority and Severity. I include definitions and standards for Priority and Severity either in the Test Strategy for an organisation or in every test plan for every project. Note that without this in place; it is impossible to do any trend analysis.
    2. A commitment to fairly recording defects in every phase of the project no matter what methodology you use. Otherwise it is possible to make certain phases look better than others by ignoring or failing to record the defects.
    3. A commitment from management to the years it will take to obtain sufficient statistics for trends to be meaningful.
    4. A commitment to and an understanding of the methodology used to reconcile projects that of different size and that are built in different ways. A very large project built in-house cannot be directly compared to a small project where the software was purchased.
    5. An understanding of the statistical processes that will be used to generate the trends. It is far too easy to draw the wrong conclusion
    If any of these prerequisites are not in place before anything starts, you are embarking on an expensive failure!

    Photo by Stephan Henning on Unsplash

  • Review of the Year – Automation

    Review of the Year – Automation
    Automation of software testing is something that seems to be on the minds of many Quality Assurance Managers and Test Leads. It has been a popular topic for many years.

    Currently we get requests for particular tools and knowledge of their attributes in particular environments; these are usually serviceable. Current status seems to be a separate tool for every need and environment and sometimes every organisation. Based on past experience, in a few years, someone will consolidate all the disparate technologies under one umbrella tool. Then the cycle will start again with people inventing new tools for specific niches and products.

    We also receive requests for people to “automate our testing” with no decision on the tool attached. This is a completely different question and requires some discussion to occur before the attempt to automate even starts. We need to know the what; when and Why the company wants to automate their testing. The thing we want to avoid are the actions below.

    1. Purchase Automated Test Tool.
    2. Install Tool.
    3. Wait for successful automation to save all the cost of the tool and cost of manual testing.
    4. Become disillusioned.
    5. Go to 1; Repeat ad infinitum.

    This has occurred over and over in different organisations. A lot of money gets used up with no progress and eventually the organisation gives up on the cycle and continues manual testing (see last week’s blog).

    Our best recommendations are as follows:

    Look up where you are on the technology maturity level with your current technology.

    Decide what you need (criteria are available) in terms of automation and what you are capable of handling based on maturity level.

    Then do a Plan to implement your automation. Never assume it will just occur. It won’t.

    Want to discuss how to automate effectively? Contact us.

  • Review of the Year – Manual Testing

    Review of the Year – Manual Testing

    Manual Testing is something that seems to be on the minds of many Quality Assurance Managers and Test Leads. Usually they want out of the Manual Testing and view Automated Testing (Blog planned for next week) as the saviour of their budget and time constraints.

    However, judging by the vacant positions we get requests to fill, there is still no shortage of Manual Testing positions at least in our area. There are still a lot of requests for Manual Testers with business knowledge preferred and new software and startups still start with manual testing. We get requests for Automated Testing with specific tools usually requested and will discuss this next week.

    The part that seems to be missing from many of the requests and the subsequent position is any discussion of the How; What; Why; When; and If; of the manual testing.

    There seems to be limited thought given to How the testing is to be done apart from some vague request to build testcases and execute them.

    Little consideration is given to What to test and Why beyond the statement: “We need to test the software”.

    When and If are not such an issue: Yesterday and definitely are the one word answers to those questions.

    These answers certainly provide freedom for the tester to do what they want but that may not always align with all the stakeholder’s wishes and may be 180 degrees off in some cases.

    This leads to a poor ROI and a large waste of time and money.

    There will continue to be a market for manual testers for new changes and new applications that are not yet mainstream. We expect automation to take over many of the repetitive tasks (as has always been the case) The only open question at this stage might be what AI will do to the industry. That we cannot predict.

    Want to discuss the effectiveness of your Manual Testing further? Contact us.

  • QA with No time

    QA with No Time

    One of the constant issues that comes up in discussions or classes is the lack of time for Quality Assurance and Quality Control. We seem to be under constant time pressure and with Agile and DevOps it has become worse rather than better.

    While Quality Assurance cannot anticipate everything, the Continuous Improvement aspect can help improve the time considerations. The key is to prioritise and plan for the high priority items to be completed.

    Some people will say (with a fair amount of truth) that even planning for the priorities and only doing those high priority items will still not be possible in the time allotted for Quality Assurance and Quality Control. With development reacting to changing requirements from the users, constant upgrades in technology (both hardware and software) and impacts from other projects, the time scale can shrink radically.

    However, without a definitive list of what must be done and the risk of not completing attached, it is very hard to push back against the time pressure. With the list in hand, it is easier to quantify the risk of not doing something.

    Some people will say that they do not have the time to even create the list. They are under extreme pressure to start testing immediately and provide issues so the developers have something to handle now that they have finally delivered all the changes requested by the user. Our recommendation, in this case, is to simply make a list of the functions or requirements, assign High, Medium or Low to the risk of not testing that function or requirement and send it around for review. This will at least alert people to the challenges faced by Quality Assurance and Quality Control.

    Want to discuss your list further? Contact us.

  • A Better Way – Case Study 5 – Distributed with Poor Testing

    A Better Way – Case Study 5 – Distributed with Poor Testing

    In our last several blogs we have discussed ‘A Better Way to Test”.

    The issue is to apply this to actual situations. We have 5 Case Studies we plan to use over the next several weeks to address this. The fifth case study might be called “Distributed with Poor Testing”.

    In this case the developers were geographically remote, the Quality Assurance (such as it was) was local and the clients were geographically remote. This was a somewhat unusual situation since it is frequently the Quality Assurance that is remote and the other two local. However, some of the considerations had to be the same. We needed a way of communicating things without losing anything in transit.

    Two solutions came to mind immediately:

    1. Make sure there are stated expectations regarding the flow of information. This applies to any artifact like a test case, a requirement, a defect, or a design document. We did this via some flow charts we placed in the Master Test Plan although there are certainly other places they could have been recorded.
    2. Acquire some tools that will support this information store. There are many free or very cheap cloud-based tools that support these processes.

    Once we had the framework in place, we set up the appropriate loops and feedback mechanisms to ensure information flow and good quality. As time went on we expanded the groups who had access to the systems ensuring that the information flowed in the correct way and with sufficient security to the concerned parties. The two way flow of information allowed us to eliminate a backlog of defects that had accumulated and start addressing customer concerns in a timely manner.

    The investment was not large when compared to the improvements realised.

    If you want to discuss this further contact us.

  • A Better Way – Case Study 4 – Caught Between Vendor and Client!

    A Better Way – Case Study 3 – Test Plan in a Hurry!

    In our last several blogs we have discussed ‘A Better Way to Test”.

    The issue is to apply this to actual situations. We have 5 Case Studies we plan to use over the next several weeks to address this. The fourth case study might be called “Caught between Vendor and Client”.

    Although one could argue that Quality Assurance has always been caught between a Vendor or Vendors (developers) and possibly multiple clients (users), it has become a little more obvious and formal with the purchase of software from outside groups. This is not something that is going to go away. Assembly of a solution rather than building it has been around for quite a while and will probably become more frequent rather than less. The question is what Quality Assurance does to “Bridge the Gap” between what the client wants (‘perfection!’) and what the vendors are willing to supply in terms of proof given competitive secrets and possibly some Non-disclosure requirements.

    In our case (as discussed here) we built a plan that provided the final client with what they wanted. We then mapped what was supplied by the vendors against what was required and filled in the rest. Not surprisingly, the main items that were missing were Integration testing between what the various suppliers had provided and the type of testing that needed the entire system to be there including Performance, Security and Usability (to name a few).

    Bridging the gap in this fashion satisfied everyone and made use of everything that was already in place. That saved us a lot of time and allowed us to concentrate the tests that were critical to the client.

    If you want to discuss this further contact us.