Practical Software Testing

Rating:
Summary: Advanced text, introduces TMM concept
Review: This book contains material that is (or should be) familiar to software testing professionals. What makes it unique is how this material is cast into a framework, based on the SW-CMM, for software testing. Before describing the contents of the book some background is in order. The author is one of the driving forces behind the testing maturity model (TMM), and the foundation and evolution can be found in back issues of CrossTalk Magazine (accessible via the web). Specifically, she and coauthors published a series of articles in CrossTalk titled "Developing a Testing Maturity Model: Part I (August 1996), Part II (September 1996) and "A Model to Assess Testing Process Maturity" (November 1998). This early material is excellent and well developed, and this book is a culmination and refinement of those early ideas.

Much of this book is based on IEEE standards and documentation, which have been refactored into the TMM. The book starts by introducing testing as an engineering activity, then segues into fundamentals, a chapter titled "Defects, Hypotheses, and Tests, and two chapters covering test case design. This material is fairly standard fare as standalone chapters, although the latter two chapters are among the best treatment of test case design I've come across.

Within the context of the TMM the chapters on levels of testing, test goals, policies, plans and documentation (completely based on IEEE standard 829-1983), and the testing organization are core topics. Operational topics of the TMM are discussed in the chapters on controlling, monitoring, evaluating and the testing process; reviews as a testing activity, and measurement. Two chapters I particularly liked were "Evaluating software quality-a quantitative approach" and "Defect analysis and prevention", each of which bridges software testing and SQA. The final chapter ties together the book by describing the TMM and the associated test process assessment.

This book is for advanced practitioners and testing professionals who are working in mature organizations. It is not a book for new or intermediate software testers, although it would make an excellent college level text to introduce students to process-oriented testing approaches.