ISTQB Foundation Level Extension - Agile Tester. Ctfl-at: Chapter 2

In an Agile project, the sequence of development activities and the depth of testing are determined based on the priority of user stories. If the priority of user stories changes during an iteration, it can trigger a change in the sequence of development activities and the depth of testing. This is because the development team needs to focus on delivering the highest priority user stories first, which may require adjusting their effort estimation and the level of testing for the iteration.

When faced with missing information while creating test cases, a tester should ask the business representative, customer, or other team member directly for the required information. This approach ensures that the tester gets accurate and complete information from the relevant stakeholders, allowing them to create test cases that align with the requirements and expectations of the project. Relying on their own experience or intuition may lead to assumptions and potential inaccuracies, while relying solely on written documentation may not provide the necessary details.

Agile developers often create automated unit tests because it is a key practice in the Agile methodology. Unit tests help ensure that individual units of code are functioning correctly and are not affected by changes made in other parts of the system. By automating these tests, developers can quickly and easily run them whenever changes are made, allowing for continuous integration and faster development cycles. This helps catch bugs and errors early on, leading to higher quality software and faster delivery.

To mitigate the issue of regression bugs caused by a change request from the customer during an iteration, the best approach is to stabilize the iteration by prioritizing the bug fixes. This involves taking the opportunity to fix the regression bugs first, thoroughly testing them, and then integrating them into the project. By leaving the scheduled tasks until the end of the iteration, the team can ensure that the regression issues are addressed promptly and the iteration remains on track. This approach helps maintain the quality of the software and prevents the accumulation of unresolved bugs.

The tester's role in solving a bug is to work with the developer to resolve it. This involves collaborating with the developer to understand the root cause of the defect, provide necessary information and evidence, and assist in finding a solution. Testers play a crucial role in bug resolution by effectively communicating the details of the defect and working together with the developer to ensure it is fixed appropriately.

Be positive and solution oriented regarding the quality of the product

The purpose of communicating test status, progress, and product quality is to keep testers informed and make them more effective and efficient. It also helps in measuring product quality through customer surveys and various metrics. Additionally, it allows the team to track the progress towards the completion of the iteration/release through a burndown chart. However, using metrics to reward, punish, or isolate team members is not a purpose of communication in this context.

The correct answer is to establish processes and tools to apply pair programming. In a distributed team with members living in different time zones, it may not be feasible to bring team members together periodically. Creating a new team geographically located nearby would not solve the problem of different time zones. Therefore, the best approach is to establish processes and use tools that enable remote pair programming, such as screen sharing, collaborative coding platforms, and video conferencing. This allows team members to work together in real-time, despite being in different locations.

Task boards with each type of tasks (dev, test) having color coordinated tasks can provide a snapshot of the current status of tasks selected for an iteration. This is because task boards visually represent the progress of tasks by using color coordination to indicate the status of each task. By glancing at the task board, team members can quickly identify which tasks are in progress, completed, or yet to be started, providing a clear overview of the current status of the iteration's tasks.

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Test implementation is the process of developing and prioritizing test procedures, creating test data, and setting up the test environment. Defining test objectives is typically done during the test planning stage, where the overall goals and scope of testing are determined.

During the scheduling of tasks, the tester should ensure that all the testing tasks have been properly scheduled for iterations and releases. This involves reviewing the project plan and making sure that all the necessary testing activities are included in the schedule. By doing so, the tester can ensure that the testing process is properly planned and aligned with the overall project timeline, allowing for timely and effective testing of the software.

To reduce regression risk, the test team should perform functional tests for the items selected in the current iteration as well as all the previous iterations as part of the regression suite. This ensures that any changes made to the items tested and developed in previous iterations are thoroughly tested to ensure they do not have any negative impact on the system. By including these tests in the regression suite, the test team can identify any potential regression issues and address them before they impact the overall system functionality.

In an Agile project, change is inevitable and the customer requested changes to previously developed and tested features during the 6th iteration. This means that testers need to review older test cases and corresponding software versions. The test design and implementation strategy would have an impact in this situation because it needs to be flexible enough to accommodate these changes. Testers may need to modify their approach and prioritize certain test cases over others to ensure that the changes are properly tested within the shorter time frame.

Over-reliance on unit testing can hamper test effectiveness because unit testing only focuses on testing individual components or units of code, rather than testing the entire system or application. This means that important integration issues or bugs that may arise when different units interact with each other may go unnoticed. It is crucial to have a balanced approach to testing, including integration testing, system testing, and acceptance testing, to ensure comprehensive coverage and effectiveness in identifying and resolving issues.

Using wiki-style dashboards and tools to gather metrics can help testers free up their time and focus on designing and executing more test cases. By using wiki-style dashboards, testers can easily communicate the project status, while tools can aid in process improvement and record test progress and test status data. This allows for easy sharing of information through automated wiki or wiki-style dashboards. Using both i and ii together can facilitate the idea of freeing up testers' time and allowing them to focus on their core tasks.

The tester should interpret the situation as a reminder that even though the team is confident in the product's stability, the absence of errors does not guarantee that there are no errors present. There is always room for improvement in product performance, and further testing and enhancements may be necessary to optimize the product further.

The correct answer is ii and iii. This is because in traditional approaches, entry and exit criteria are used for testing, while in agile approaches, these criteria are not typically used. Additionally, there is a considerable overlap of testing activity and test levels in agile, whereas in traditional approaches, the testing activities are more clearly defined at each test level.

task board shows snapshot of status, not progress
survey can indicate product quality, but not progress of tasks
daily stand up meeting solves any bottleneck issue hampering to get a job done.

The most efficient option to implement the integration framework is to perform static analysis, code coverage, and unit tests during code check-in, while scheduling functional tests every couple of days. This approach allows for immediate feedback on code quality and coverage, ensuring that any issues are caught early in the development process. By scheduling functional tests every couple of days, it allows for thorough testing of the entire system while minimizing the impact on development speed.

The user story can be tested as a part of system level testing after the completion of the first user story. This is because the user story specifies a functional requirement related to the search functionality, and it is best to test the system as a whole after all the individual user stories have been implemented and integrated. System level testing allows for testing the interaction and integration of different components and functionalities, including the search button and the display of search results on the page.

The correct order of the flow of testing is unit test, acceptance test, and then build verification test. This sequence ensures that individual units of code are tested first, followed by testing of the overall system functionality, and finally, the build is verified to ensure it meets the required specifications. This order allows for early detection and resolution of issues at the unit level, followed by validation of the system as a whole, and ultimately, verification of the build.

In agile development, there is a significant emphasis on iterative and incremental development, making exploratory testing, which involves active exploration to find defects, a valuable technique. The importance of technical skills for testers can vary in both traditional and agile approaches. While automation is common in agile, not all testing levels require automation, as it depends on the specific context of the testing activities within an agile project.

Testers need to review test cases regularly to add, modify, delete, or categorize test cases because it is not possible to execute all the test cases, especially after a number of iterations. Additionally, due to excessive code churn, test cases may become ineffective or fail. Therefore, reviewing and updating test cases is necessary to ensure that the testing process remains efficient and the software is thoroughly tested.

In an agile project, the team can handle this situation by performing system testing even before unit testing and acceptance testing. This is because in agile methodology, test levels can overlap, allowing the team to conduct system testing alongside other testing activities. By doing so, they can address any interface changes that have taken place recently and ensure the overall functionality and integration of the system. This approach allows for flexibility and faster feedback, enabling the team to make necessary adjustments throughout the iteration.

Test first approach test cases serve as a low level design specification because they provide detailed instructions on how to test a specific feature or functionality. These test cases outline the steps to be followed, the expected results, and the inputs required for testing. By following these test cases, developers can ensure that the software meets the desired requirements and functions correctly. This level of detail makes test first approach test cases a valuable tool in the design and development process.

Both agile and traditional software development approaches involve testers sharing their knowledge and testing skills with other team members. This means that testers are not working in isolation but actively collaborating and communicating with developers, business analysts, and other stakeholders. This helps in improving the overall quality of the software by ensuring that everyone has a clear understanding of the testing process and requirements. It also promotes a culture of knowledge sharing and continuous learning within the team.

To maintain velocity without incurring a large amount of technical debt despite high code churn, it is important to have test automation at all levels of testing. This helps in quickly identifying and fixing any issues that may arise due to code changes. Keeping all the testing artifacts updated all the time ensures that the tests are relevant and effective. Enabling version control through a configuration management tool helps in managing and tracking code changes, making it easier to revert or roll back if necessary. Therefore, options i, ii, and iii are the correct choices.

The statement i is true because agile approach encourages overlapping and parallelism in order to increase efficiency and adaptability. The statement iii is also true because in agile development, system testing can be done before integration testing in order to ensure that individual components are functioning correctly before integrating them.

Option i is an example of integration between testing and development activity because it involves the collection of user stories that describe tasks for all tiers in an N-tier architecture, which includes both development and testing tasks. Option ii is also an example of integration because test cases developed during a test first approach provide an executable specification that guides the development process. Option v is another example of integration as lightweight documentation can help with regression testing, which is a testing activity. Therefore, the correct answer is i, ii, v.

The team can implement this by testing critical functionality and interface points after deployment. This ensures that only stable builds are tested and reduces the chances of wasting time on non-stable builds. Performing unit tests after the build is deployed to the test environment (option i) and performing unit tests before code check-in (option ii) may help in catching issues earlier but do not specifically address the concern of testing non-stable builds. Acceptance tests after deployment (option iv) may be important for overall testing but do not specifically address the concern of testing non-stable builds.

In order to maintain a stable and working software, real-time test reporting is needed to identify, isolate, and correct bugs. This allows for immediate detection of any issues that may arise with each new change integrated into the software. By having real-time test reporting, developers can quickly address and fix any bugs, ensuring that the software remains stable and functional. This approach helps to prevent any potential code breakages and ensures the overall quality of the software.