This week’s Betica Blog post focuses on some of March’s more interesting news stories from the QA world. If you want to check out the QA news from last month, take a look at this blog post. The topics contained within hopefully trigger some inspiration on your own software testing efforts.
Those of you working in software quality assurance tend to be happier compared to most other professions, a fact revealed by Software QA Engineer making the CareerBliss list of the Top 10 Happiest Jobs in 2016. This news appeared in Forbes. While software testing can be stressful at times, its advantages definitely outweigh any negatives, especially considering the opportunity to work on innovative technologies.
The tech world in general is well represented on the top ten list, with Full Stack Developer, Android Developer, Senior Java Developer, Chief Technology Officer, Lead Developer, and Lead Engineer all present. Software QA Engineer placed at number 9.
For comparison’s sake, the two highest-ranking jobs on the CareerBliss Top 10 Unhappiest Jobs of 2016 list are Sales Account Manager and Security Officer. Revenge of the Nerds finally comes true!
Even in the current fast-paced Agile era of software development, different aspects of software testing remain relevant, especially performance testing. News about slow web applications goes viral on social media within a few hours. This week, the developer website DZone reported on some performance testing fallacies your QA team needs to consider.
Simply throwing hardware at a performance issue isn’t the best solution. Maybe a memory leak is the source of the problem? Ensure the right amount of performance testing is done before an app reaches production; especially if the development team is possibly overconfident in its own abilities.
DZone also noted the difference between speed and perceived performance in the Agile era. Even with fast load times, customers may feel an application is slow if it takes too long to access their desired information. In this scenario, maybe the user interface design is too complex?
Additionally, the testing team shouldn’t let an absence of errors during validation lull them into a false sense of security about an application’s performance once it hits production. The bottom line is simple. Performance testing remains vital in software development.
Sometimes even the technology giants get QA wrong. Apple’s recent iOS 9.3 update for the iPhone and iPad contained a bug in the activation process that essentially bricked older devices — most notably the iPad 2. This news was reported on in Computerworld among many other sources.
When installing this update, a user is prompted for their Apple ID and password. If they didn’t remember their credentials, or simply mistyped the password, the device stayed hung in an activation cycle, unable to be used. Cupertino quickly released an update without the password requirement for activating the new OS version.
The moral of the story: test updated software on ALL supported devices. Stay tuned to the Betica blog for future stories of interest for QA professionals all over the world.
Posted on April 8, 2016 April 7, 2016 | Categories Quality Assurance | Tags News, Quality Assurance, Software Testing