STAREAST 2020 Tutorial: X-Ray Vision For Testers: How to Analyze Things


Tuesday, May 5, 2020 - 8:30am to 4:30pm

X-Ray Vision For Testers: How to Analyze Things

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How do we go about understanding something complex? How do we move from confusion to clarity? What strategies and approaches can we use to identify and reason about things that matter? When we’re dropped into a testing situation, how do we make sense of it all? How can we rapidly achieve a deeper understanding of things that we know little or nothing about? How can we develop skills to make us more powerful testers? The answer to these questions is analysis - the study of things and ideas by examining their elements and structure. In this one-day tutorial, Michael Bolton will lead exercises and discussions on the critical testing skill of analysis which can be applied to testing, products, technologies, systems, language, test conditions, risks, problems, strategies and more. Leave this tutorial with an understanding of how we go about analysis, modeling, geometric and linguistic analysis, systems thinking and patterns of scientific investigation; all of which improve our understanding of the object being analyzed.


Michael Bolton is a consulting software tester and testing teacher who helps people solve testing problems that they didn’t realize they could solve. He is the co-author (with senior author James Bach) of Rapid Software Testing, a methodology and mindset for testing software expertly and credibly in uncertain conditions and under extreme time pressure. With twenty-five years of experience testing, developing, managing, and writing about software, Michael has led DevelopSense, a Toronto-based testing and development consultancy, for the past fifteen years. Previously, he was with Quarterdeck Corporation where he managed the company’s flagship products and directed project and testing teams both in-house and worldwide. Contact Michael at [email protected], on Twitter, or through his website.