Test Planning - Software Testing: Testing Across the Entire Software Development Life Cycle - page 82

curious about testing some aspect of an application and go off on a tangent,
wasting both valuable time and resources on testing that is interesting but
out of scope.

(a) Development phase —this is the name of the development phase for
which these occurrences of the items (a) through (g) are planned.
(b) How can you tell when you are ready to start testing in this phase ?—at
fi rst glance, this seems to be a trivial question, but on deeper examina-
tion, this may be a complex question based on the availability of only
partially completed development.
(c) How can you tell when you are fi nished testing in this phase ?—this is a
complex question any way you wish to consider it. The crux of the matter
is that all of the test cases may have been executed, but the backlog of
software defects discovered by these test cases has not been resolved.
(d) Test cases list (ID, title, and brief description) for this phase —this is the
summary list of test cases that you think are needed to adequately cover
all the testing situations in this development phase. This list is refi ned
a number of times as more details about the application design become
available.
(e) Test case writing schedule —once the needed test cases are identifi ed,
somebody has to take the time to write out their details. This is a work-
intensive activity with the testing expert doing the writing and with the
assistance of the business expert and the development expert.
(f) Test case execution schedule —once the test case is written and validated,
an execution schedule must be drafted that takes advantage of test case
dependencies, precursors, and postcursors to provide the most expedi-
tious test execution and results gathering possible.
(g) Test case execution results analysis and reporting schedule —this
schedule extends the test execution schedule to include time to analyze
and report test results. Usually, there is some analysis time and minimal
report drafting time associated with each test execution so that the tes-
ters can begin to see the nature of the testing outcome early in the test
execution schedule. Then, if adjustments need to be made in the test
execution to accommodate surprises, there is test execution schedule
remaining for the tactical adjustments. This fi rst allotment of analysis
and reporting time can range from a half day to a couple of days per
test case. A second allotment of time is made for the analysis of results
across multiple test case executions for more pervasive trends and com-
pletion of the drafted report. This second allotment of time can range
from 2 to 4 weeks depending on the size and complexity of the testing
project.

<Draft>Overall testing schedule —this schedule is the composite of all test
case documentation, execution, and reporting schedules for all development phases.
This schedule represents the master schedule of testing activity that the test team
must manage.

10.