Effective Methods for Software Testing, Third Edition

Chapter 16. Rapid Application Development Testing

Rapid application development (RAD) is an effective software development paradigm that provides a systematic and automatable means of developing a software system under circumstances where initial requirements are not well known or where requirements change frequently during development. Providing high software quality assurance requires sufficient software testing. The unique nature of evolutionary, iterative development is not well suited for classical testing methodologies; therefore, the need exists for a testing methodology tailored for this developing paradigm. Part of the tailored testing methodology is ensuring RAD is the right development methodology for the system being developed.

Overview

This chapter describes a testing strategy for RAD: spiral testing. This document shows key RAD characteristics impinging on testing and the value of spiral testing to support evolutionary, iterative RAD. This testing strategy assumes the RAD system

• is iterative.

• is evolutionary.

• contains RAD language with a defined grammar.

• provides reusable components capability (library and retrieval).

• uses implementation code from reusable components written in a high-level language.

• contains a sophisticated support environment.

These characteristics will keep the RAD paradigm sufficiently general to discuss testing concerns. Because program verification and validation are the most costly activities in current development, any changes to RAD to simplify testing ...