Editor's note: What are the best practices in moving data to the clouds?
Learn more here!
Janet Gregory has been a long time icon of mine. When I was asked to write
an article for the Agile Journal regarding Agile testing I was honoured. The
first person I thought of was Janet Gregory and Lisa Crispin as their book,
Agile Testing, was a huge help to me when I was first learning about this topic.
After contacting Janet about co-authoring the article, we quickly discovered
that we had a very strong difference of opinion. We decided to share that with
you in this article. You may feel strongly one way or another from reading this
article, and the comments from the conversation, but please remember we are
all trying to do the same thing. Increase quality, of our software, and help
others to do the same.
Bob Small and Janet Gregory share their thoughts and experiences relating to
the difference between QA (quality assurance) and testing.
Bob:
I see a clearly defined difference between quality assurance as an activity
or effort in preventing defects from entering the system and agile testing,
which would be any activity in discovering defects in the system.
Janet:
I really don't like to draw a distinction between the two ideas. What testers
do on an agile team is testing. The prevention part is testing up front - I
test the assumptions, I test the customer's interpretation of the problem, etc.
I don't like the phrase "quality assurance," because I don't think
we can actually ever 'assure' the quality of a product.
Bob:
Ok, so if you are on a Scrum team and you are in a planning meeting, who is
responsible for ensuring that the stories are testable? Not that I am saying
you need to actually test the stories then and there, but who raises their hand
and states that a story is un-testable? I do not see that as testing, I see
that as quality assurance. Here, you are assuring the quality of the application
through defect prevention, by not allowing the team to have a poor story in
the next iteration.
Janet:
Over the years the phrase, 'quality assurance or QA,' has changed to mean different
things to different people, which is why I really hesitate to use it.
As a tester I don't need developed software with a UI to start testing. I can
test a requirement and test the proposed solution. I encourage people to test
scenarios if the customer draws a flow diagram. I can ask for, and maybe provide
examples and edge cases as tests. These types of tests (business facing tests
that support the team), help everyone to get a shared understanding of what
to expect, and eliminates many hidden assumptions.. Is that quality assurance?
I find it simpler to say that it is testing to support the team in its effort
to reduce the rework fixing defects later. Once we've developed something, we
can validate it against these examples (or tests) and check to see if it is
acceptable. I believe that is what you are calling testing.
You also asked who is responsible for ensuring the stories are testable. As
a tester, I have a special interest in it. If it is not obvious, I will ask
the question in the planning session. However, it is the whole team's responsibility
to make sure it meets that quality attribute.
-1-
Print this article
Email this article
Talk Back!
Write to Editor
