Bruce Crozier
Business Software Analyst
Quality
Test Design
Quality
assurance should really be more of a development method than a function. That
said, there is frequently a need for the business software customer to verify
that the product meets their requirements and is of acceptable quality. A
detailed test plan will give the vendor a clear definition of the customer’s
expectations and a quantitative benchmark for contract fulfillment. There is no
such thing as an exhaustive test of a business application that amounts to more
than a name and address database. Good testing acknowledges that fact and first
tries to identify those flaws (design or code) that may affect critical data
and processes. Second, it defines the “grooved path” of the application, i.e.,
the keystrokes and/or mouse clicks that the user is most likely to execute in
the use of the application, and looks for flaws along that path. Third, it
considers the structure of the code and tries to economize testing by
concentrating in areas that the test designer considers to be the most likely
problem areas. Once these perspectives are considered, the test designer can
consider other dimensions of the application such as input boundaries or
validation, read/write integrity, security, performance and load testing, etc.
A test plan may consist of the execution of one test script or multiple tests
from multiple hardware platforms or over various communications setups.
In
addition to my general knowledge of business software development, I spent over
a year as a contractor to a major ERP software provider developing and
executing tests for their package. That package consisted of over 10,000
programs, had over 4,000 user control settings and over 75,000 decision points
in their sales order entry program alone. This example
is a single test script developed for their sales tax calculations.
