A Simple Solution of A Common Problem

Problem:

A new aspiring tester in the team was given the test cases and asked him to execute the test cases. This new aspiring tester was just completed his degree in computer engineering. He was one of the brilliant students in his batch. Everybody including the management of the company was expecting him to do well in his job. So this new tester started executing the test cases for the first time and then for the next time and so on. All test cases were passed and no bug was logged.  

After a month the tester was terminated from the project.  As per management the new aspiring tester couldn't become a tester because he didn't have the flame that a tester must have. The Tester was expelled from the team. Now he was sitting on the bench and thinking what went wrong.

How many of you have seen this problem? Actually I have seen a few and I had been also thinking what went wrong in this case.

Understanding the Problem:

Recently I was reading a clinical tale by Oliver Sacks. The tale was about a patient who was congenitally blind with cerebral palsy. The conditions are more pathetic than we can think of – she was suffering of spasticity and athetosis, i.e., involuntary movements of both hands, which was added due to failure of the eyes.

After initial tests and checkup it was found that there was no sensory ‘deficit’. Her hands would seem to have the potential of being perfectly good hands—and yet they were not. They were functionless—’useless’—because she had never used them. Had being protected and looked after since birth prevented her from the normal exploratory use of the hands which all infants learn in the first months of life.

Can you correlate the problem with the case mentioned above?

The real problem is that new aspiring tester was being pampered by the management itself. Instead of really doing the testing he was asked to follow the test cases which are most probably written by someone else. Initially, following the test cases made his task easy. He used to execute the test cases and finishes the task early. He couldn’t learn how to test from this exercise and we all know the result. The tester was put on bench (Literally killed the aspiring tester)

Solution:

A new aspiring tester in the team was given the application and asked him to test it for all the functional and usability issues. This new aspiring tester was just completed his degree in computer engineering. He was one of the brilliant students in his batch. Everybody including the management of the company was expecting he would do great in his profession. So this new tester who was hesitant initially started with exploring the application. Think about the infant who reaches for the breast when feeling hungry. Similarly the new aspiring tester took some time but he did some testing and logged few good issues.

Benefits from this Solution:

• Confident and satisfied tester
• Better Testing
• More No. of bugs
• A lively job
• Better Self Education
• Happy Management

What do you think? Does it seem a right solution to you?

Reference: "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat" by Oliver Sacks

I am an Impersonator

I am a tester for some time now. A tester plays different roles for his job so do I and believe me I am happy about that. It seems that I am living life of an Impersonator. Some of you might be thinking what is an Impersonator?

An impersonator is someone who imitates or copies the behavior or actions of another.

Now when you know what is impersonator, you must be thinking why I am so happy about it? Actually I don’t think that any other career than testing can give me opportunity to play such different roles and this is not an exaggeration. When an actor can proud on his different characters played in different movies then why can’t I.

Different roles which I play

I am an Advisor: An Advisor is normally a person with more and deeper knowledge in a specific area i.e. a specialist. As a tester I generally play the role of an advisor. I give them suggestions from my experience with different products during development, I suggest them how they can make software better. I suggest them during bug fixing. Even I suggest them how to display an error message. What if they don’t follow every time what I suggested, sometimes even they don’t consider it but they always know I am doing best to help them and they are always keen to know my thoughts. That is sufficient for me.

I am a Police Officer: A Police officer is generally charged with the apprehension of criminals and the prevention and detection of crime, and the maintenance of public order
In Beautiful Testing, Linda Wilkinson has said:

Are testers policemen? Not usually. They can’t “arrest” anyone for breaking a law, even if the world of software development could figure out what those laws should be, and most do not have the authority to keep something from moving to production, regardless of the generic goodness (or badness) of the software.

According to me, a tester also wears a cap of a policeman. As a policeman, I find the culprit who breaks the laws of an application and put it behind the bar. The culprit in this case is a bug. I find the bug and log it in the bug sheet.

I am a Detective: A detective is any licensed or unlicensed person who solves crimes, including historical crimes, or looks into records. My job allows me to play the role of a detective.
For being a good tester, it is important to have good detective skills. A good tester is not who finds an issue, a good tester finds the issue and the reason behind that issue and here I need my Detective Skills to find the reason behind any issue. Sometimes I fail to find the reason but I always try. It helps me to know the product better than anyone else.

I am a Lawyer: A lawyer is a person who is learned in law and licensed to practice the law. As a detective I found the evidences and found the culprit, as a policeman I have put the culprit behind the bars but what if the culprit is escaped due to poor advocacy. To win a case we need strong prosecution against the culprit otherwise the defense lawyer can make him free. Similarly, sometimes we need strong prosecution skills against a bug. I need to describe the impact of the bug to the developer. In Software Testing it is called as Bug Advocacy.

I am a Critic: A critic is a person who offers reasoned judgment or analysis, value judgment, interpretation, or observation. Like a critic, I analyze a product according to my knowledge and share my views with the stakeholders about the product. I don't bother about what they want to hear actually, I just give them an honest opinion.

I am an End User: An end-user as the person who uses a product. This is the most important role which I play. It is an end user who is going to use the product finally so it is important to understand an end user for the success of the product. I test any product with the perspective of an end user and discuss my views with the development team and other stack holders so that they can improve the product accordingly.

I am a Reporter: A reporter is a type of journalist who researches and presents information in certain types of mass media.
Any news is breaking news if it is most significant story of the moment. It could be a story that is simply of wide interest to viewers and has little impact. As a reporter, I report the entire bug with all the evidences as soon as I find them. Late reporting can cause benefit to other reporters. Once an issue is found, I immediately report it.

I am a Salesman: A Salesman represents a person or company on the selling end of the deal. A real Salesman is that who sells the product to a customer when he needed it least. Sometimes I need to sell the bugs. I have found the bug, I have reported about it, On the basis of my bug advocacy it is also proved that the bug is critical and must be fixed but still I need to make the developers to fix it in current release. In that case, I use my Salesman skill to convince them to fix the bug immediately. It’s like selling a bug.

I am a Tester: and in the last but above all I am a tester. I need to change my role according to the situations but it is only because of the need of my Job. My basic job is to test the product. It is versatility of my job which allows me to wear the different caps at different time.

Am I missing any role? I might be....do tell me....... :)