Software Testing Books

This book was written in 1987, and many parts of it are still germane. The approach to solving DSP problems, and of testing DSP circuitry are timeless, as long as DSP circuits will exist.

What does need to be updated is text that reflects the massive gains in DSP complexity and speed since then. If anything, the debugging problems are much harder now, due to these hardware advances. In an industrial context, this is important because the Automated Test Equipment field has had to make massive investments in upgrading, to maintain its usefulness.

Overall, you can still find the book useful today, for its problem solving way of thinking.

There is little better information for helping understand the cost of testing and impacts of automation. There are many useful details and industry references. It is easy to read and covers considerable details and history of testing.

However, be careful with what example numbers and industry references you use. Recalculate the numbers by hand. Many of the numbers did not add correctly with minor unexplained differences with weighted averages. There are several improper table references, but there was enough detail to find the right table.

I've been in IT for almost 20 years now and just about all of the books are pie in the sky theory and cut and paste methodologies that don't work in an actual deployment.
(Why didn't I give this book 5 stars? I would've like some "anatomy of a failure" type lessons learned. But I would've given it 4 1/2 stars if possible.)

This book eschews the theory and talks about what needs to be done to put a service into a production environment and keep it up and running. If you're looking for some great guidelines as to what needs to be done to get a product up and running, this is the book.

As a software test professional, I make a plea to my testing colleagues to get this book. There needs to be more focus on the non-functional aspects of putting a service into an operational state and so little testing is done these days with that in mind.

For developers, it provides a good list of tips for making a system much more responsive with regards to status and reporting in a production environment. Great reminders for Devs to build a system that works in the environment to which it will be deployed.

Get it!

"Perl Debugger Pocket Reference" is a relativly short introduction into the command line Perl Debugger (perl -d option). You will find the following main chapters in this book:

- Introductory chapters (partly meta chapters not about the debugger but about good programming)
- Debugger Commands
- Debugger Variables
- Debugging Options
- Debugger Internals, Quick reference, rest

When I bought this book I had hoped for a "...Pocket Guide" and not a "...Pocket Reference" (deeper coverage). I consider this not an extreme "...Pocket Reference" (like e.g. "Perl Pocket Reference") because this book contains examples for each of the commands and options that it describes. For me examples are the most important part in technical books.

The language, the printing and the index (there is an alphabetic index) are of the usual high O'Reilly standard).

I think that "Perl Debugger Pocket Reference" might be a bit heavy if you never used a command line debugger like gdb or xdb before. This book assumes that you already know what and why you want to do with the debugger, you will be explained WHO to do this with the debugger. PDPR is missing the process model when using a debugger. Personally I would have wished for even more examples and a bit more about when to use a certain feature of the debugger.

For all those poor souls like me that still have to use Perl 5.5, you will not like this book because it explains the cool new features of the Perl 5.8 debugger (differences to Perl 5.6 covered as well) that are missing in Perl 5.5. I hope that I can convince my customer to upgrade to Perl 5.8 to be able to use cool new debugger (especially the w watchpoints will be great).

I will keep this booklet next to my keyboard when I am Perl programming from now on to be able to lookup the Debugger functions that I will need. If you are a Perl programmer like me that does not produce flawless code, I really recommend this book. I will use it again right after finishing this review. Perl debugging will be more fun (for me) from now on.

Ian Dees is wise enough to realize that automation is not the Ultimate Solution to Everything, pointing out that "some domains are better suited than others for automation". "So," he asks, "why not let the computers and people each do what they're good at?" To that end, he offers his new book "Scripted GUI Testing with Ruby", a book for testers who code and coders who test -- and maybe for others, as well.

As the title implies, test scripts are written in the Ruby language -- and its Java implementation, JRuby -- and the author assumes that readers will have some experience with Ruby. If you've written and run a few Ruby scripts, you'll be fine. Ian doesn't require you to be a black-belt Rubyist to understand what's going on here, and his humor helps keep it interesting.

Ian's guinea pig for client-side testing is LockNote, a simple text editor that saves your notes with password-protected encryption. The program is freely available for Windows, and Ian has developed his own cross-platform Java/Swing version, dubbed "JunqueNote". Using these two applications, Dees teaches us how to automate testing of GUI applications on both the Windows and Java platforms. You'll learn how to launch the app and use API calls to find windows, automate keystrokes and mouse-clicks, and more. This can be valuable as either a means to an end, or as the end goal itself; whether you're testing software, or simply looking to automate it via the user interface.

In one chapter, Dees provides a gentle introduction to the popular RSpec Behaviour Driven Development framework. In another, he shows how we can simplify our test code by separating out the common code from the platform-specific code.

Because the focus is on software testing, the author devotes a chapter to leveraging randomness to expose bugs that might otherwise be missed. Another chapter focuses on the ZenTest test matrix library. A later chapter delves into testing web-based applications using Selenium and WATIR, and how to combine these with RSpec.

As a Ruby on Windows advocate, I'm pleased to see a book that devotes more than just a half-dozen pages to Windows-specific task automation. But "Scripted GUI Testing with Ruby" spends a good deal of time discussing Java-based testing, as well.

This book is targeted at software testers, and they'll certainly be the section of the market that gets the maximum value from it. But it has potential value beyond that niche. There's something useful to be learned by both testers and non-testers, on both Java and Windows platforms.

Simulation engineers seem to happen...rather than according to a plan. They build a model to solve a problem of theirs one day, and pretty soon other people are bringing them their problems to build models for.

This book is good for those of us who have followed that path. It links together those pieces that seem to float free in our knowledge bases, and helps to define the overall picture of doing a simulation and the topics that need to be addressed at a fundamental level when building a complex simulation.

If you want a beginning book...this ain't it. But if you have the need...then this is a good book to start with.

I made the mistake of assigning this book for CSE 5321 Software Testing (a graduate course) at the University of Texas at Arlington during the fall of 2008. I abandoned it 2/3 of the way into the semester.

The title of my review pretty much says it all.

Takes a while to get used to the book. Not the easiest to understand
Lots of good information and concepts. Strongly recommended if you are willing to do the brain work

Book is broken into 3 parts: Methodology (20%), Functional Testing (55%) and Performance Testing (25%). In the functional and performance testing parts, there is a balance between discussions on testing infrastructure - such as the SAP Solution Manager, detailed how-to using tools like eCATT, and mini-case studies from customers that will assist a customer to view testing in a bigger picture. The book isn't a replacement for an eCATT training course. It is aimed more at those with responsibility for the planning and implementation of testing.

Have you recently been tried to create a web page or web application or tried to web enable an existing application? Have you researched how this should be done best before you started to create the program code? If so, you may have come across "Web Engineering", edited by Emilia Mendes and Nile Mosley. The editors make the claim that an established engineering discipline like Software Engineering despite its usefulness for development of traditional applications does not provide sufficient solutions to the challenges web based applications pose. The assumption the editors (and all authors of the chapters in the book) make is that there is and will continue to be a fundamental difference between traditional software applications and web-based applications. It is indeed an interesting question whether Web Engineering as a new engineering discipline is needed or not. You might think that the difference between both areas is too small, knowing that many full-fledged web applications started their life as "normal" applications and were later on "web enabled", i.e., a layer was put on top of them to make them appear in web browsers.

Nevertheless, there seems to be a consensus that there is not such a high degree of maturity in the engineering discipline for software (be it web-based or traditional software) as it exists for example for car manufacturing. What does not appear to be acceptable to customers of other products, i.e., the fact that customers receive insufficiently tested and hard to use products where users sometimes emerge into beta-testers instead of using the product from day one on after shipment and have to install numerous patches before the product starts working flawlessly can be a reality in the software domain. The book tries to provide a solution to this problem.

To structure the domain the book is organized in thirteen chapters. In each chapter the book addresses a different aspect of web engineering. Each chapter is written by a different team of authors. A great variety of aspects is covered. Only a few areas, for example supportability of web-based applications in customer support cases and security of web-based applications are missing from the description. Overall the book gives valuable guidance when planning the creation of web applications. Practitioners can use the book as a checklist to make sure that no relevant aspect is overlooked when creating a web based application. Each chapter represents an item on the checklist. People in academia benefit from the book as it is probably the first comprehensive write-up of the topic of Web Engineering. It covers the spectrum of Web Engineering broadly - diving deep down to the mathematical foundation for some aspects, only scratching the surface of others. Even if engaging in hands-on work is not the motivation for reading the book it definitely gives an excellent overview of almost all relevant aspects of the engineering of web-based applications.

Judging by the intent of the authors and the content of the book, I would say that their aim was great but the execution and many practice exam questions were horrendously flawed, to the point where it becomes too frustrating for the candidate to continue with their material. As their service to MCSE candidates is emphatically important, the quality of many, many questions leave too much to be desired. Sorry - this application has generated an error and must be terminated.

I passed the NT 4 Workstation exam last month with 900/1000 and NT 4 Server last week with 899/1000. All I used was Alan Carter's Windows NT 4 Study Guide, the books in this series, and Transcenders to pass the exam (didn't take a single class). The materials are clearly written and easy to understand with illustrations. Make sure you do the practice exams at the end of each book and the ones on their website before using Transcenders. If you understand the material rather than memorizing all the facts, you should pass the exam with no problems. These books are a wonderful supplement to the Alan Carter Books and comes with a "cram sheet" for last minute review before your exam.

The most important thing to remember for all of you pursuing your MCSE is the hands-on experience with the OS while using ANY study guide. Build a simple, 2 computer network at home while using these books. This will distinguish you from being the "Paper MCSE". Passing the exams is one thing, but when your network at your place of business is in dire trouble, panic is not an option.

I had barely touched NT Server, took no classes, and purchased no additional texts with which to supplement these books. Using Exam Crams and Transcenders, I had the MCSE wrapped up in less than four months. Yeah, my social life suffered over that time, but the point is, these books have what you need to pass.

I read a couple of reviews that docked the quality of the CD. I didn't touch the CD, so that could be perfectly true. The books are pretty darn accurate, though, so buy the pack and stick with the printed page and you'll be good to go.

One word of caution is that the practice quizzes and tests in these are less challenging than and/or not too applicable to the actual exams. I urge you to cough up some money for the Transcenders and take them only after you have read and studied these books. They are so much like the real thing (harder in most cases) it is frightening.

I was working on a help desk when I bought these books. Now I support NT servers internally for a Fortune 100 company, and make close to double what I made about 6 months ago. Nuf said.

Contrary to other reviews these books are it. I passed my third test on Thursday(Workstation) with a 900/1000 and used this book alone with Transcenders as my resources. They are great if you already are doing the work my need some brushing up on the gray areas. I will use these books for my next three test and into my Win 2K cert.

Instead of spending large amounts of money on training classes for the MCSE, I bought this set of books. I was able to read the books,take the practice tests supplied with the books and pass the MCSE tests.