Automated Testing Information

Do you have a fascination for software testing? A fascination with the underlying simplicity which is juxtaposed against the real-world complexity? We do too! Underlying everything is that simple concept of a set of actions, some expected output and a pass/fail result. Then Scale that up in the real world and everything suddenly becomes a lot more complicated. Bolt automated testing on top and that seems to take things into a new dimension of complexity. Lets face it. Theres something quite fascinating about the simplicity of software testing. At its core is the simplest of concepts. The concept of one action, one expected result and a pass/fail result. Such simplicity. And a simplicity that on the surface should scale with ease. More product to cover, add more actions, more expected results and more passes, more fails. When everything else in software engineering is beset with complexity this would seem like a refreshing aberration. Indeed for most in software engineering, at an organisational level, weve been able to run testing in a parallel universe separate to the development. Anyone outside of the QA team has been able to ignore most of the complexity. In that waterfall world where development and test seem to live separate lives, everyone else (except the test team) could hide from the complexity of testing. They could keep living with that simple belief that testing is done separately, in parallel. Keep believing that theres nothing complicated in there to worry about. So long as those test reports, charting progress, keep popping up then everything is okay. For decades though the testers at the coal face have recognised, and worked diligently, to manage that real heavyweight complexity that makes up this discipline. And it is complex. Really damn complex. Cans of worms spring to mind. And most really dont want to take the lid off that can. They dont want to because deep down they know that once those worms start to escape its going to be damn hard to get those worms back in. The reality of what you ...