The Art of Software Testing, Second Edition

6.5. Test Planning and Control

If you consider that the testing of a large system could entail writing, executing, and verifying tens of thousands of test cases, handling thousands of modules, repairing thousands of errors, and employing hundreds of people over a time span of a year or more, it is apparent that you are faced with an immense project management challenge in planning, monitoring, and controlling the testing process. In fact, the problem is so enormous that we could devote an entire book to just the management of software testing. The intent of this section is to summarize some of these considerations.

As mentioned in Chapter 2, the major mistake most often made in planning a testing process is the tacit assumption that no errors will be found. The obvious result of this mistake is that the planned resources (people, calendar time, and computer time) will be grossly underestimated, a notorious problem in the computing industry. Compounding the problem is the fact that the testing process falls at the end of the development cycle, meaning that resource changes are difficult. A second, perhaps more significant problem is that the wrong definition of testing is being used, since it is difficult to see how someone using the correct definition of testing (the goal being to find errors) would plan a test using the assumption that no errors will be found.

As is the case for most undertakings, the plan is the crucial part of the management of the testing process. The components ...