Featured Sessions — Management

These featured sessions explore the business aspect of test automation from a managerial perspective. Gain valuable insight into achieving buy-in from senior management, and discover how test automation fits in both the testing and development lifecycle. Determine what you need to do in preparation for test automation, and learn how to select the right tools and processes to ensure project success.

M1 Wednesday, March 27, 10:15 a.m.–11:15 a.m.

Deliver Reliable Applications Faster With the Right Tools and Processes Dave Kapelanski, Compuware Corporation Dave Kapelanski has more than 27 years of experience with application development and testing initiatives. His experience extends across mainframe, distributed, and Web environments. During his career he’s been involved with a variety of applications that adopted emerging technologies such as the use of radio frequency-equipped devices, the electronic imaging of back-office systems, and distributed customer call centers including their Web enablement to provide self-service capabilities. Repeated attempts to decrease software time-to-market have borne a variety of processes and methodologies, resulting in dynamic development and testing environments that continue to ignore quality issues as well as budget constraints.To gain control of your project costs while still ensuring your application’s quality, the use of automated software tools must extend beyond that of any single process. Dave Kapelanski teaches you to leverage test automation software within each of the four lifecycle quadrants: development and integration, testing, production readiness, and performance and transaction availability management. • Learn when to use remote testing services • Determine when it’s time to bring outsourced functions back into your organization • Discover ways to ensure your applications are delivered on time and within budget

M2 Wednesday, March 27, 11:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

Measuring the Effectiveness of Automated Functional Testing Ross Collard, Collard & Company Ross Collard is a consultant currently working on testing and quality assurance projects for American Express, Citibank, Dell, General Electric, and Nortel. He has a master’s degree in computer science from California Institute of Technology and an MBA from Stanford. He has also taught courses on testing for the University of California Berkeley and Harvard University. Many struggle to accurately judge the value, success, and return on investment of test automation. In this session, Ross Collard helps you identify which areas and aspects of testing — both manual and automated — provide fruitful opportunities for improvement. You’ll have the opportunity to compare the effectiveness of your organization’s test automation with industry norms and best practices. You’ll also see how other organizations gather, interpret, and apply these metrics. Find out what’s worked and what hasn’t. • Determine which test automation metrics you should be gathering • Learn to use this data and the conclusions derived from it • Find out the limitations of your metrics

M3 Wednesday, March 27, 2:00 p.m.–3:00 p.m.

Get Control of Your Test Automation Project Jeff Tatelman, Spherion Technology Architects Jeff Tatelman has more than 20 years of quality assurance, management, and consulting experience in the software development industry. He’s developed software quality processes to support all phases of the software development lifecycle, and has implemented structured and automated testing, change management, and tools to support the software quality process. Jeff has also been responsible for implementing requirements-based testing at several Fortune 1000 companies including NCR, Sprint, Coca-Cola, and SunTrust Bank. He’s the co-founder of the Software Quality Association in Denver. To develop an automated regression test bed is no easy task. In fact, according to recent studies, more than 50% of test automation projects fail. To improve this statistic, companies must establish a consistent, repeatable approach for implementing test automation projects. Jeff Tatelman uses an inventory control application to teach you the key steps — from requirements gathering through implementation — to ensure success on any test automation endeavor. • Organize your test automation project tasks into phases • Develop a matrix on what to test based on requirements • Learn to design the best test automation approach for your environment

M4 Thursday, March 28, 10:00 a.m.–11:00 a.m.

The Business Case for Test Automation Linda Hayes, WorkSoft, Inc. Linda Hayes is CEO of WorkSoft, Inc., a software company specializing in test automation. She has more than 19 years of experience in software quality and testing and holds degrees in accounting, tax, and law. Linda is a frequent speaker and award-winning author of books and articles, including a monthly column in Datamation. In tight economic times, it’s more important than ever to show a return on technology investments, including test automation. Unfortunately, management’s expectations are usually unrealistic in that they expect immediate results and aren’t prepared for the ongoing level of investment required after the tool is purchased. Find out why the benefits traditionally promised — reduced test resources and cycle time — are misleading and inaccurate. • Learn to properly set expectations and increase your chances of success • Acquire new techniques to quantify the return on your test automation investment • Find ways to justify additional time, money, and resources

M5 Thursday, March 28, 11:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

Achieving Software Quality Through Test Automation Process Integration Brian Bryson, Rational Software Corporation Brian Bryson is technology evangelist for Rational Software Corporation’s automated testing business unit. He works directly with engineers and managers to determine strategy and deliver the messaging for Rational’s automated toolset. Since joining Rational in 1995, Brian has spoken to individuals and audiences worldwide on numerous aspects of quality automation. A former instructor at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, Brian has delivered Rational’s message of quality automation to students as well as employees of such organizations as Microsoft, Sun Microsystems, and Oracle. With increasing demands for high-quality software applications in shorter development cycles, it’s clear that teams need to go beyond simply running tests at the end of their development cycle. Instead, teams must approach development with quality as their primary objective. Brian Bryson shows you how to integrate automated testing tools with best practices to implement an effective quality assurance process from the beginning (and throughout) the development lifecycle. • Examine the challenges inherent in the design of complex applications, and the enormous cost of developing a flawed application • Find out how to ensure quality in each stage of application development • Learn to incorporate comprehensive test automation early in the development lifecycle without limiting the test to the front end of the application

M6 Thursday, March 28, 2:00 p.m.–3:00 p.m.

Test Tool Implementation Risks and Rewards Rick Craig, Software Quality Engineering Rick Craig is an experienced test manager, consultant, and lecturer. He has helped hundreds of companies improve their testing in countries throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, and the Americas. Rick has been a featured speaker at testing conferences since 1983. He’s the former American editor of Software Quality Management magazine, as well as co-author of the Systematic Software Testing Handbook. Rick is a colonel in the United States Marine Corps Reserve. Did you know that an alarmingly high percentage of the test tools purchased are never successfully implemented? Many organizations could benefit tremendously from the effective use of testing tools; problem is, they’re not sure how to go about it. This session examines a dozen or more of the most common pitfalls encountered in the acquisition and implementation of testing tools and offers suggestions to avoid these mistakes. • Learn to avoid common pitfalls • Discover where to initially focus your test automation • Obtain hints on how to achieve buy-in

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