Agile Testing: A Practical Guide for Testers and Agile Teams

Part V An Iteration in the Life of a Tester

Whenever we do tutorials, webinars, or Q&A sessions with participants who are relatively new to agile development, we’re always asked questions such as “What do testers do during the first part of an iteration before anything’s ready to test?” or “Where does user acceptance testing fit into an agile release cycle?” It’s easy to expound on theories of who should do what and when, in an agile process, but we find giving concrete examples from our own experience is the best help we can give agile newbies. Through our talking to many different agile teams, we’ve learned that there’s a lot of commonality in what works well for agile development and testing.

In this part of the book, we’ll follow an agile tester’s life throughout an iteration. Actually, we’ll explore more than just an iteration. We’ll start with what testers do during release or theme planning, when the team looks at the work it will do for several upcoming iterations. We’ll give examples of what testers can do to help the team members hit the ground running when they start the iteration. We’ll show how coding and testing are part of one integrated process of delivering software, and we’ll describe how testers and programmers work closely and incrementally. We’ll explain different ways that testers can help their teams stay on track and gauge progress, including useful approaches to metrics and handling defects. We’ll look at testing-related activities involved in wrapping up an iteration and finding ways to improve for the next one. Finally, we’ll examine a tester’s role in a successful release, including the end game, UAT, packaging, documentation, and training.

The activities described in this slice-of-life look at agile testing can be performed by anyone on the team, not only testing specialists. On some teams, all team members can, and do, perform any task, be it development, testing, database, infrastructure, or other tasks. For simplicity, in this section we’ll assume we’re following someone whose primary role is testing as they help to deliver high-quality software.