Ruud Teunissen, Polteq Test Services

The Awful Truth About Estimation:

Have I been wrong all along?

www.eurostarconferences.com

@esconfs#esconfs@RuudTeunissen

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How do you estimate your effort,…

… if you don’t know what to do

… if you don’t know how to do it

… if you don’t know who will do it

… if you don’t know where to do it

… if you don’t know with what to do it

… if you don’t know when to do it

… if you don’t know what to do first, last, in between

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Approaches

• Predefined budget

• Industry standard

• Similar projects

• Historical data

• Test Point Analysis TPA®

• Intuition of the experienced tester

TPA® is a registered

trademark of Sogeti

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Predefined budget

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Industry Standard

On average XX % of the hours spent on the total

development project is reserved for testing

unit test

integration test

system test

acceptance test

regression test

the rest

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Similar projects / Historical Data

When you want somethingyou’ve never had,

you have to do somethingyou’ve never done

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Test Point Analysis

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Effort Estimation

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Test EffortEstimate

StrategyWhat?

How thorough?

ImpactComplexity?interaction?

ProductivityHow “good” is

my team?

Infra&ToolsHow “fast” can

we test?

ExpectedQuality

Test object?Test basis?

SizeHow “much”?

Scope?

My “philosophy”

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Philosophy – Input from the delegates

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Size

• % of project budget

• Size of requirements

• Size of system under test

• Intuition (is it magic after all?)

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Size – Input from the delegates

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Business Risks Test StrategyConsequences of a failing product

Business Risk Aspect to test Priority ProbabilityTest

Priority

1. …Security Medium High High

8. …

2. …

Accuracy High High Critical3. …

4. …

6. …

5. … Efficiency Low Low Low

7. … Interoperability Low High Medium

9. … Usability Medium Medium Medium

10. … … … …

Detect the most important defects as soon as possible within time and budget

Based on risks

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Strategy – Input from the delegates

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Impact

Core

Ring 1

Ring 2

Core

CoreCore CoreCore

Each (change to a) component has a

different impact and therefore requires a different test effort

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Impact – Input from the delegates

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Expected quality

• Requirements

• Software Development

– Approach (if any), Life Cycle, Maturity, Experience, …

• Quality Assurance

• Previous experience

– Defects, Test Cycles, …

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Expected Quality – Input from the delegates

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• Continuous integration

• Knowledge & Experience

• Timeliness

• Availability

• Representative

• Regulated

• Free format

• Fit for purpose

Infrastructure and tools

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Infra & Tools – Input from the delegates

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Productivity

• Business / Domain Knowledge

• System / Application Knowledge

• Test Knowledge

• Test Experience

• Test Training

• Interpersonal Skills

• Certification?

• Stand alone versusmultidisciplinary

• …

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Productivity – Input from the delegates

Questions?

About the speaker

Ruud TeunissenPolteq Test Services, The Netherlandsruud.teunissen@polteq.com - http://www.polteq.com

Ruud Teunissen is best described as a passionate software tester. Throughout his career he has played almost any possible role in testing (tester, test manager, test trainer, coach, sales, manager, test consultant, …) in a variety of environments and companies. Ruud is coauthor of several books on structured testing, including Software Testing: A Guide to the TMap®

Approach. Currently he is senior test consultant with Polteq Test Services BV and focuses on test improvement and management in any context.