BIO

Louise recently started work as a Senior QA Analyst at MandM Direct, an online sportswear retailer. Before this, she worked at Malvern Panalytical, a company that developed scientific instruments for a variety of industries, most notably pharmaceuticals. She was involved in testing the software used to carry out automated particle imaging and raman spectroscopy to identify particles in a mixed sample.

Louise graduated from Bangor University with a degree in Computer Science for Business. Her first job after university was as a software tester for Loyalty Logistix, a company that produced Web, Mobile and Desktop applications that allowed members of the Automotive industry to run Loyalty schemes for customers.

#1 Talk

The Joy of Record and Playback in Test Automation

Record and playback features are a really useful tool for automated test development. They allow code req uired to run automated tests to be generated quickly. However, there is an unfortunate misconception that it is only used by those with poor programming skills. Record and playback features are a really useful tool for automated test development. They allow code req uired to run automated tests to be generated quickly. However, there is an unfortunate misconception that it is only used by those with poor programming skills. Louise does not believe this is the case, as even those with excellent programming skills may choose to use record and playback as an initial code generator. This can really speed up the development of automated test cases. Louise also believes that some may feel excluded from test automation because of their lack of programming skills. Record and playback features are an excellent way to introduce people to automated test development. Record and playback features does have its limits. There are some actions that cannot be recorded so need to be coded instead. Tests made up entirely of recordings can be awkward to maintain, and have difficulty recovering from failures. Therefore, any code generated from recordings needs to be changed to improve the maintainability and robustness of the tests. In this talk Louise will demonstrate how recordings and the code generated from recordings can be adapted when developing automated test cases.

#2 Talk

Quality not Quantity – Getting Value out of Test Automation

Test automation is becoming more and more popular as part of a software testing strategy. However, there is a danger of using test automation incorrectly. If the wrong tests are automated, then the time and resource spent developing these tests is wasted and very little value is gained. If the right tests are automated, then the value gained from test automation can exceed the cost of developing the test.
But how do we decide which tests are best to automate?
In this talk, I will show how I try to get the most value out of automated testing by identifying problems with the current test strategy. Tests which are most likely to solve this problem are the ones chosen for automation.
Following this, I will suggest various metrics that could be used to demonstrate the value and progress that has been gained from the introduction of automated tests. Demonstrating value is important as support for test automation development will be lost unless there is proven value.