When a programmer builds a product, should he release it to the testers right away? Or should he test it himself to make sure that it is free of obvious bugs?
Many testers would advise the programmer to test the product himself, first. I have a different answer. My answer is: send me the product the moment it exists. I want avoid creating barriers between testing and programming. I worry that anything that may cause the programmers to avoid working with me is toxic to rapid, excellent testing.
Of course, it’s possible to test the product without waiting to send it to the testers. For instance, a good set of automated unit tests as part of the build process would make the whole issue moot. Also, I wouldn’t mind if the programmer tested the product in parallel with me, if he wants to. But I don’t demand either of those things. They are a lot of work.
As a tester I understand that I am providing a service to a customer. One of my customers is the programmer. I try to present a customer service interface that makes the programmers happy I’m on the project.
I didn’t always feel this way. I came to this attitude after experiencing a few projects where I drew sharp lines in sand, made lots of demands, then discovered how difficult it is to do great testing without the enthusiastic cooperation of the people who create the product.
It wasn’t just malicious behavior, though. Some programmers, with the best of intentions, were delaying my test process by trying to test it themselves, and fix every bug, before I even got my first look at it (like those people who hire house cleaners, and then clean their own houses before the professionals arrive).
Sometimes a product is so buggy that I can’t make much progress testing it. Even then, I want to have it. Every look I get at it helps me get better ideas for testing it, later on.
Sometimes the programmer already knows about the bugs that I find. Even then, I want to have it. I just make a deal with the programmers that I will report bugs informally until we reach an agreed upon milestone. Any bugs not fixed by that time get formally reported and tracked.
Sometimes the product is completely inoperable. Even then, I want to have it. Just by looking at its files and structures I might begin to get better ideas for testing it.
My basic heuristic is: if it exists, I want to test it. (The only exception is if I have something more important to do.)
My colleague Doug Hoffman has raised a concern about what management expects from testing. The earlier you get a product, the less likely you can make visible progress testing it– then testing may be blamed for the apparently slow progress. Yes, that is a concern, but that’s a question of managing expectations. Hence, I manage them.
So, send me your huddled masses of code, yearning to be tested. I’ll take it from there.
This entry was posted on Saturday, July 8th, 2006 at 5:03 pm and is filed under Software Testing and Quality. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.