Applied Software Project Management

Test Environment and Performance Testing

It is important for the project manager to get involved in setting standards for verifying that software has sufficient performance. It may seem like this is a detail that can be left up to the testers, but it can't. In fact, it's absolutely necessary that the project manager work with the team to try to forecast how the product will be used.

Performance requirements really should be in place as early as the scope definition phase. When the project manager is writing (or helping to write) the vision and scope document for the product, she should ask questions about the environment in which the product will be deployed:

• How many users will be using the software?

• How many of those users will be using it concurrently?

• Does the software need to be available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week?

• Are there peak usage times?

• How much data will be stored in the database?

• What physical hardware will the software be running on?

• What version of the operating system will be used?

• Is security a concern?

• Will the software need to run under multiple environments (OS, hardware, etc.)?

• Will the software need to be updated or maintained after it is rolled out?

All of these things will affect how the software is tested. Even though all of the details are not known when the vision and scope document is written, all of these issues should at least be raised, and any known information should be recorded. That way, the requirements analysts will make sure to discover the answers ...