QA

Articles

Significant-other Unit Version 1.0

Significant others not only provide personal support, but can also provide the objective voice that can make your work even better. Next time you're stuck with presenting an idea or writing a paper, run it past your significant other for her opinion. In this week's column, Mike Andrews talks about how he incorporates his wife's opinion into the work he produces, and how her insight improves the quality of it.
Mike Andrews
September 9, 2005
The Goldilocks Parable: How Much Process Is Just Right

Getting process improvement "just right" is difficult. Go too far in the definition of processes, and it really does get too hot, with the heat coming from the people trying to use the processes. On the other hand process definitions that are too short to contain anything of value will leave users in the cold, and then there will be no improvement in the organization. Ed Weller states that a useful process improvement activity develops a set of process artifacts that meets the needs of the user. This helps the organization capture "tribal lore" and cast it into a set of process definitions that eliminates waste and improves time-to-market.
Ed Weller's picture Ed Weller
March 17, 2005
Best Practices from Integrated Test and Development Teams

Team building sessions: few like to attend those things. Yet, the benefits of teamwork are constantly praised and rewarded. Even this article praises teamwork, but does not suggest any touchy-feely exercises to bring test and development teammates closer together. Deborah Kablotsky specifically covers understanding each other and working together throughout a project's lifecycle, a proven way of working together to shorten test cycles and deliver high quality products on time. She also discusses the necessity of integrated teams and provides some proven tips successful to Web-based businesses on making this best practice a reality.
Deborah Kablotsky's picture Deborah Kablotsky
February 17, 2005
QA Preventing Failure Suffering for Success

One of the most valuable services a QA group provides is preventing failure. Ironically if the group succeeds at this, QA might find themselves unpopular or out of a job. Linda Hayes reveals how typical methods of measuring success can actually cause failure. Especially if success is achieved at the loser's expense.
Linda Hayes's picture Linda Hayes
February 4, 2005
TimeLine Postmortems

We should use project postmortems to improve our software process. But few teams do, and fewer teams reliably learn from project postmortems. You can introduce postmortems to your team easily with a timeline postmortem process. If you are already doing postmortems, a timeline-based approach may improve your results.
This process:

  • Takes little time (a few hours).
  • Has a high degree of software engineer acceptance.
  • Provides immediate feedback into your development process.
  • Increases team cohesion and rapport.
  • Reduces finger pointing.
Seth Morris
January 9, 2005
Keeping Secrets

Test data has long been a challenge for testing; privacy legislation, identify theft, and the continued trend towards outsourcing has made it even worse. Just establishing and maintaining a comprehensive test environment can take half or more of all testing time and effort. In this column, Linda Hayes adds in the new and expanding privacy laws that inevitably limit your testing options. Yet from the quagmire of laws and company standards, better testing can emerge.
Linda Hayes's picture Linda Hayes
December 16, 2004
An Ounce of Goat or a Pound of Hero: Software Reviews and Inspections

Being a hero is great, but only if your heroism doesn't involve a situation you could have avoided in the first place. In this week's column, Harry Robinson explains that goats are to forest fires as early detection tools are to the software development process. There is a lesson about software reviews and inspections in this comparison that testers and project heroes can benefit from.
Harry Robinson's picture Harry Robinson
October 8, 2004
Building Good Software Redefining Quality

These days, the word "Quality" is thrown around so much it's starting to lose its meaning. In this column, Elisabeth Hendrickson explains why she thinks organizations need to focus more on building good software and less on buzzwords.
Elisabeth Hendrickson's picture Elisabeth Hendrickson
February 26, 2004
Human Communication on Projects

Tackling communication issues at the start can set a project up for success. Staying alert to communication issues during a project means keeping the lines open, clear, accurate, and helpful. Then when the deadline approaches, the schedule slips, or serious problems start cropping up, issues can be confronted much more smoothly and efficiently. In this column, Eileen discusses how human communication affects projects from start to finish.
Eileen Strider
October 23, 2003
Stop the Bad MBOs

Some managers use "management by objectives" effectively; however, too often they are used destructively and undermine the team. In this article Rex gives the clarion call to stop the bad MBOs and gives three case studies of what not to do.
Rex Black's picture Rex Black
September 2, 2003

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