“No test environment, no comment!”
Once you have established your pre-requisites the next factor to consider is the environment.
Unless the test environments are ready then nothing can begin, also check that the specification of environment sensitive testing is covered e.g. localization/language checks. Elements to look for here are ensuring that the build and the data layer are accurately aligned. Many false positives will be given if there are missing new data fields or tables. This is where a smoke test is best adopted, this is a very lightweight run through of some key processes just to check that the environment, database and build are aligned and ready to test.
A good way of thinking about this is if you needed to release the build within a few hours, what would be the tests to run? These would be the ones that would make the best smoke tests.
This is an extract from a whitepaper titled “Top Ten Factors for a Successful Regression Test” which takes you through the key factors that will ensure the best outcome – if all is as it should be and no defects have found their way through – then you have conducted a successful regression test.
Jonathan Pearson is a Customer Success Manager at Original Software.
