Software Testing Life Cycle (STLC)

Like SDLC, STLC has fixed phases which are mentioned in hierarchy below:

1.      TEST PLANNING – Preparing the test strategy & planning Test planning consists of

Defining the test strategy

Estimate the no.of test cases, their duration, cost, Plan the resources

Identify areas of risk

Definining the test completion criteria

Identification of methodologies, techniques, and tools to various test cases Identifying reporting procedures, bug classification, data bases for testing

The major outputs of test planning Develop a test case format

Develop test case plans according to every phase of SDLC Identify test cases to be automated

Prioritize the test cases according to their importance and criticality Plan test cycles required for regression testing

2.      TEST Design –it is well planned process

It includes the some critical activities such as

Determining the test objectives and their prioritization

From the requirements specification and design documents identify the testing objectives. Depending on the scope and risk give prioritize the test objectives

Preparing list of items to be tested Objects are converted into list of objects

Mapping items to test cases

Need to create a matrix for knowing which test case is will be covered by which item. The matrix will help in

i)                    Identify the major test scenario

ii)                  Reducing the redundant test cases

iii)                Identifying the absence of a test case for particular objective and as

a result, creating them

The tester who designs the test cases must understand the cause-and-effect connections also. Some attributes of good test cases are

i)                    Criticality and high risk priority are given highest priority

ii)                  Good test case is one which is capable of finding high probability of finding an error

iii)                Test cases are not overlap or be redundant

iv)                Good test case is one which always follow the modular approach

v)                  Test case always able to find an undercover errors

Selection of test case design techniques

Basically there are two testing techniques Black-box and white box testing techniques

Black-box testing techniques – in this generate test cases without knowing the internal working of a system

Creating test cases and test data

test cases are created based on testing objecting, test data means input data given to the test cases.

Setting up the test environment and supporting tools

Environment includes h/w configurations, testers , tools, interfaces, manuals .Tools like QTP, load runner

Creating test procedure specification

It is sequence of steps, this procedure used by the tester at the time of testing

Test Execution

In this phase all test cases are executed and test results are documented in the test incident reports, test logs, testing status, and test summary reports.

Testing levels versus responsibility

Test execution level	Responsibility
Unit	Developers of the module
Integration	Testers and Developers
System	Testers. Developers, End-users
Acceptance	Testers, End-users

Post-Execution /Test Review

Bugs should be reported to the developers after test execution successful

Understanding the bug- after getting test execution report to the Developer has to understand its whereabouts.

Reproducing the bug-once again need to execute the test case with invalid inputs so that the bug should reproduce once again

Analyzing the nature and cause of the bug-after getting bug report based on incidents the bug nature is analyzed It consists of two analyses

i)                    Reliability analysis-this analysis helps predefined reliability goals or not

ii)                  Coverage analysis- this is alternative criterion to stop testing

iii)                Overall defect analysis- this analysis is identify risk areas and quality improvement