24 / 07 / 19

OTP#6: Websites for Testing, Resume Achievements & Heuristics

Outside The Parameters (OTP) is a human-authored micro-correspondence focused on Software Testing, published every other day.

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Heuristics in Testing

If we agree that 'testing is not exhaustive' and there cannot be a case where we (as Testers) are given enough time to test, we will always face the dilemma of balancing both realities.

This is where applying 'heuristics' (pronounced as hyoo-ris-tiks) to your testing enters the scene.

Heuristics testing uses experience-based methods, mental shortcuts, rules of thumb, patterns, or principles that help you make decisions, solve problems, and perform tasks in software testing - given time constraints.

Today, we'd look at one example of a heuristic used to consider the 'usability of errors'.

After executing negative tests for errors, these errors need to be further tested for usability; and FAILURE is one of the ways to do that.

FAILURE means

  • Functional

  • Appropriate (or Apropos*)

  • Impact

  • Log

  • UI

  • Recovery

  • Emotions

Functional
Are errors detected and reported? Are error dialogs working as expected?

Appropriate (or Apropos*)
Are errors detected and reported, accurately and timely? Do we allow the user to waste time before we tell them that what they did won't work? Can error messages be understood by our users?

Impact
Does the error message contain too little or too much information as to what caused the error and the impact of the error?

Log
Are logs detailed enough to aid troubleshooting? Are we logging too much?

UI
Is there a visual indication that there's a failure? Are error messages consistent, esp. look and feel? Are dialogs excessive or appropriate? Are errors communicated in an efficient manner?

Recovery
Does the error message tell the user how to recover from the error condition? Is the user prompted through the recovery or left to figure it out on their own?

Emotions
Does the information in the message add to a user's frustration or help quiet it? Does the error message cause more confusion? What emotions are likely to be raised by the error message?

Something different today.

Resume Achievements You Can Customise

  1. Implemented automated tests using Selenium and Java for a complex web-based application, increasing test coverage by 70% within the first year.

  2. Managed a QA team responsible for ensuring the quality of a suite of mobile banking applications used by over 1 million users.

  3. Conducted thorough manual testing for e-commerce applications, which helped in identifying 200+ bugs before going live.

  4. Executed over 1000 test cases for a high-traffic social media platform, significantly improving application stability and user satisfaction.

  5. Designed and executed performance testing strategies for cloud-based services, which supported 500,000 concurrent users smoothly.

  6. Developed an automated testing framework using Python and pytest for a complex data analytics platform, reducing manual testing efforts by 60%.

  7. Played a pivotal role in a major redesign project that enhanced the user experience for a SaaS application, improving customer retention by 15%.

  8. Implemented a strategic plan for test automation using Appium and Cucumber for a suite of native mobile applications that cut testing time by 35%.

Websites You Can Use to Practice Testing

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