Tools and techniques for

superior test management

White paper

Table of contents
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
The need for test management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
What is test management? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
The test management process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
HP Quality Center software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Introduction
In recent years, the field of application testing has
evolved. The growing complexity of today’s
applications, combined with increased competitive
pressures and skyrocketing costs of application failure
and downtime, have catapulted the need for testing to
new heights.
While the pressure to deliver high-quality applications
continues to mount, shrinking development and
deployment schedules, geographically distributed
organizations, outsourcing and high turnover rates for
skilled employees make application testing challenging.
Faced with the reality of having to do more with less,
juggling multiple projects and managing diverse and
distributed project teams, many organizations are
adopting test management methodologies and are
turning to automated test management tools to help
centralize, organize, prioritize and document their
testing efforts.
This white paper explores the challenges and rewards
of test management and provides practical ways to
help you implement an organized and structured
testing process. In addition, this paper discusses the
benefits of HP Quality Center software, which
addresses the need for global test management.
The need for test
management
In the world of application development, many
organizations do not seriously consider testing until
programming is almost complete. Testing at this phase is
inadequate in light of increasing demands for software
quality and shorter release cycles. As a result, the role of
testing in the application lifecycle is changing.
Fueled by competitive pressures and high costs of
downtime, organizations are now beginning to define
their testing plans as they create their applications.
Planning your testing in parallel with your development
provides a key advantage. The knowledge you apply
to the application design can also apply to your
testing strategy.
The application testing strategy is evolving into a multi-
stage process with its own methodology, structure,
organization and documentation. Similar to the
development process, a testing process needs a
methodical, building-block approach that includes your
testing requirements, planning, design, execution and
analysis—to provide coverage, consistency and
reusability of testing assets.
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Based on a project’s objectives, your test managers
can create a master test plan, which communicates the
testing strategy, priorities and objectives to the rest of
the team. Using the master plan, your testers can
define test requirements or specific testing goals.
Requirements define what needs to be tested and
identify the objectives, such as performance goals.
Once your testers have defined your testing
requirements, they can begin developing testing
procedures that meet and validate your requirements
and run the tests.
The goal of a test management process is to create
one central point of control that is accessible to all
members of the testing team. This central point houses
all testing assets and provides a clear foundation for
the entire testing process—from deciding what needs
to be tested to building tests, running scenarios and
tracking defects. The test management methodology
also supports the analysis of test data and coverage
statistics to provide a clear picture of the application’s
accuracy and quality at each point in its lifecycle.
What is test
management?
Test management is a method of organizing
application test assets and artifacts—such as test
requirements, test plans, test documentation, test scripts
and test results—to support easy accessibility and
reusability. Its aim is to deliver quality applications in
less time. Test management is firmly rooted in the
concepts of better organization, collaboration and
information sharing. Planning, designing and running
tests represent a considerable amount of work, but
these efforts are rewarded when all testing assets are
shared by testers, developers and managers alike,
preserved when a tester leaves the team and reused
throughout an application’s lifecycle.
Do it right or do it over—compelling
reasons for test management
Although test project management is widely accepted
as a common practice, most organizations don’t have
a standard process for organizing, managing and
documenting their testing efforts. Often, testing is
conducted as an ad-hoc activity that changes with
every new project.
Testing without following planning and design
standards can result in the creation of tests, designs
and plans that are not repeatable and cannot be
reused for future test iterations.
If you think a testing process is difficult to implement
and even more challenging to enforce and maintain,
consider the cost of redundant work and accidentally
lost and overwritten testing assets. Without a central
point of control and clear, repeatable methodologies,
it’s difficult to keep your testing projects on track and
deliver quality applications on time with limited
resources.
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Without a standard foundation for test planning, execution
and defect tracking, testing efforts are non-repeatable, non-
reusable and difficult to measure.

Daily builds and numerous tests clearly defined testing process and an easy-to-use,
intuitive collaboration method, a geographically
The process of releasing a new build every day and then
distributed, “virtual” testing team likely results in
checking it for consistency, functionality and compatibility
greater problems and complexity than benefits.
is becoming increasingly popular not only in the web
environment, but in any organization that builds complex,
Many tests, many projects
dynamic applications. The sheer number of tests and
versions can make the testing process overwhelming and Effective testing requires a systematic process. When
nearly impossible to manage. A well-defined, systematic your testing team manages multiple projects, each with
approach to testing and a centralized repository for test its own cycles and priorities, it’s easy to lose focus.
plans, tests and execution results can significantly Almost no organization can dedicate a testing team to
increase the accuracy of your tests and add value to one development project. At best, a testing team is
frequent builds. part of the development group for a particular product.
Additionally, you need to validate multiple functional
Managing changing requirements areas, builds and baselines, different platforms and
environments, and a vast number of integrations. To
Complete requirements-based testing helps a new
track multiple test cases, your testers need a process
application meet your users’ needs. Ideally, you would
that allows them to manage multiple projects and
test each requirement at least once and some
clearly define the objectives of each one.
requirements several times. But constant time and
resource constraints make it extremely difficult to
More than bug tracking—meet
conduct comprehensive testing of all requirements. As
a result, your testers must prioritize the requirements business outcomes
that they test. And requirements undergo frequent Some IT organizations regard testing as a bug-tracking
revisions and changes, which your tests should reflect. activity. It’s true: your testing team’s primary
responsibility is to find defects. However, a testing
Without a test management process that ties test plans
process is more than recording bugs and passing them
to application requirements and lets you track changes
to developers. Testing should focus on verifying that the
in requirements to test cases—and vice versa—it’s
application’s design and functionality meet your
nearly impossible to design tests that verify that your
business requirements and your users’ needs. To
application contains the functionality that you require.
achieve those goals successfully, a testing process
requires clearly defined system specifications and
Global testing
application business rules.
Globalization is affecting testing, like most other IT
operations. Even small companies often distribute their Early in the lifecycle
testing teams throughout a country or the world. In
Early problem detection can be as much as ten times
addition, as part of cost-saving measures and higher
less expensive than finding issues during production,
availability of qualified testers, some companies are
requiring that testing and development begin
turning to an outsourced testing model. It’s not
simultaneously. However, to implement testing earlier in
uncommon to have multiple development and testing
the lifecycle, your testers need a clearly defined set of
teams, composed of in-house and outsourced staff,
goals and priorities to help them better understand
spread around the world, working on the same project.
system design, requirements and testing objectives. A
The Internet makes communication among these teams well-defined, structured and intuitive test management
easier, but how can you prevent members of your process can help them meet your testing goals and
distributed team from accidentally deleting each other’s enhance the quality of your applications.
files or working on duplicate defects? Without a

4
The test management during the development process, you need to test the
entire application based on its requirements so that the
application functions as expected. Of the many types
process of requirements, functional and performance
requirements most often apply to the testing process.
The basic principles for test management are the same, Functional requirements help validate that the
regardless of the underlying platform or how you write application contains specific functionality and should
your tests. Test management begins with gathering and be derived directly from the use cases that developers
documenting your testing requirements and continues use to create the application.
through designing and developing your tests, running
the tests—manual and automated, functional and Performance requirements include the performance
load—and analyzing application defects. standards and specifications, such as transaction
response times or maximum numbers of users,
The testing process is not linear, and it differs identified by the project team. These requirements—
depending on your organization’s practices and also referred to as service-level objectives
methodologies. This section delves deeper into each (SLOs)—increase the likelihood that the application
phase of the test management process and explores can scale to the expected number of users and provide
what it means to have an effective method for a positive user experience.
organizing, documenting, prioritizing and analyzing
your entire testing program. Both functional and performance requirements give the
testing team a clear, concise and functional blueprint
Requirements management with which to develop test cases. Most software testing
The testing process begins with defining clear and managers agree that it’s impossible to test everything,
complete application requirements that can be tested. even in a rather simple application. To test every
Developing and managing these requirements are feature and functional permutation, you may need to
critical for developing and testing your software develop thousands, if not millions, of test cases, which
applications and should reflect your organization’s needs. is unrealistic given time-to-market goals and other
pressures. Requirements-based testing is one way to
To use a metaphor, a team of architects needs to consult help you prioritize your testing effort.
with the homeowners and thoroughly document their
requirements before designing and building a house. You can group requirements according to how critical
Otherwise, the homeowners may end up with a house they are to your business success. You must test
that completely differs from what they envisioned. extensively the requirements that affect the core
Building a house without requirements is difficult enough, functionality of your application. You can address the
but the problem becomes greater when dealing with not-so-critical requirements with minimal testing effort
software applications, which are intangible, complex and or later in the lifecycle.
constantly changing. For example, if you test a new release of a mature
Research shows that more than 30 percent of all software product with only a few functional changes, your
projects fail before completion and that this failure is testing effort should concentrate on the modified or
largely due to ambiguous, poorly worded and badly enhanced areas. These changes are usually well-
defined requirements. All too often, requirements are documented in the development or marketing
neglected in the testing effort, leading to a chaotic specification documents, and you can derive the
process in which your testers fix what they can and testing requirements from them.
accept that they will not verify certain functionality.

You achieve quality only through testing the

application against its requirements. Although unit
testing of individual components may be sufficient

5
The test management process lets you organize,
document, prioritize and analyze your
organization’s entire testing effort.
Recognizing the importance of requirements-based
development and testing, testing solutions now include
a variety of tools designed to aid the creation,
traceability and management of application
requirements. Some of these enterprise requirements
tools are sophisticated and complex. Others offer
basic functionality designed to assist in creating,
storing and documenting requirements. The key to
selecting the appropriate tool is the functionality you
need. Most organizations still use word-processing
tools or spreadsheets to track requirements; however,
commercial tools designed for requirements
management are a better choice if you want a solid,
flexible, requirements-based testing process.
Requirements-based testing helps keep your testing
effort on track—even when priorities shift, resources
become tight or the time for testing runs out.
Requirements-based testing measures quality against
your end users’ needs.
Planning tests
Comprehensive planning is critical, even with short
testing cycles. Planning your tests and designing your
applications simultaneously gives you a complete set of
tests that covers each function the application is
designed to perform. If you do not address test
planning until later in the application lifecycle, much of
the design knowledge is lost, and testers will need to
return to the analysis stage in order to recreate what
had been done before.
During a test planning phase, your testing team
identifies test-creation standards and guidelines, selects
hardware and software for the test environment,
assigns roles and responsibilities, defines the test
schedule and sets procedures for running, controlling
and measuring the testing process.
The test plan itself contains test designs, test
procedures, naming conventions and other test
attributes. Use the planning phase to define which tests
are needed, how to execute these tests and the risks
and contingencies that require planning.
Establish the rules
Your testers don’t need overly bureaucratic processes
to slow them down, but ambiguities and a lack of
clearly defined procedures can make testing a
bottleneck for product deliverables. You should
establish rules for keeping test logs and documentation,
assigning roles within the team, agreeing on naming
conventions for tests and defects and defining the
procedure for tracking progress against project goals.
Set up your test environment
You need to create a test environment to support all
testing activities. Consider all issues that have long
lead times as early in the testing process as possible.
The planning phase is the time to complete hardware
and software procurements, network installation, test
environment design and special arrangements that
may be necessary during the actual testing phase.
Define test procedures
During the planning stage, your testers determine
whether tests are going to be manual or automated. If
the test is automated, your testers need to understand
which tools to use for automation, and estimate what
techniques and skills are needed for the effective use
of these tools. While test automation is mandatory for
many organizations, most companies still use manual
testing. Regardless of the type of testing you use—
manual or automated—you need robust test
management processes.
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Develop your test design
You can represent your test design as a sequence of
steps for executing a test (as done in manual testing)
or as a collection of algorithms and code that
support more sophisticated, complex tests. During
test planning, your testers create a detailed description
of each test and identify the types of data or ranges of
data that the tests require.
Map your test data
You need to map the requirements for your test data
against your test procedures. Your testing team must
understand what types of data they need to support each
type of test, and how to obtain or generate this data.
Design your test architecture
The test architecture helps your testers understand the
test building blocks and assists them in developing the
actual tests. The test architecture helps you plan for
data dependencies, map the workflow between tests
and identify common scripts that may be reused for
future testing.
Communicate your test plan
Once you create the test cases, you must create a
master test plan and communicate it to the rest of the
organization—specifically project leaders, developers
and marketing personnel—letting them know what
your testing group will be testing. In this way, more
people in your organization have visibility into the
project and can add their input, questions or
comments before the actual testing begins. The test
plan can also provide visibility into testing projects for
your executives. Having access to organized, detailed
plan data gives your executives the confidence that
they are working with a professional quality assurance
(QA) organization and are getting value from their
technology and human resource investments.
Running your tests
After addressing test design and development issues,
your testing team can start running tests. To test the
complete application, your testers need to perform
various types of testing—functional, regression, load,
unit and integration—each with its own set of
requirements, schedules and procedures.
You set up the test environment in the planning phase,
so at this time, your testers can view the available
hardware and choose which tests to run on which
systems. Typically, applications are tested on different
operating systems, different browser versions or other
configurations. During the test-run phase, your testers
can set up groups of systems to increase the efficiency
of your lab resources.
Scheduling automated tests is another way to optimize
the use of your lab resources as well as save your
testers time by running multiple tests simultaneously
across multiple systems on the network. You can schedule
tests to run unattended, overnight or when a system is in
least demand for other tasks. Using automated tests also
makes the scripts more reusable and easier to maintain
by letting you create more modular tests and schedule
them in a certain sequence.
Having an organized, documented process not only
helps your automated tests. It also helps make your
manual tests more accurate by providing your testers
with a clearly defined procedure that specifies the
tasks they need to perform at each step in the manual
testing. For both manual and automated tests, your
testers must keep a complete history of all test runs,
creating audit trails to help trace the history of the tests
and test runs.
Create your test sets
A popular way to manage multiple tests is to group
them into test sets, according to a business process,
environment or feature. For example, you can group all
tests designed to verify the log-in process under the
“Log-in” test set. You can assign individual tests, both
manual and automated, to test sets to help your testers
thoroughly cover the functional areas of your application.
Set your execution logic
To verify application functionality and usability, your
tests must realistically emulate your end users’
behavior. You should follow the predefined logic, such
as running certain tests after other tests have passed,
failed or completed. For example, a user logs into the
system, enters a new order and then exits the system.
To emulate this simple business process, you should
run the tests in the same sequence: log-in, insert order,
log-out. You should set the execution logic rules prior to
executing the actual tests.
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Manage your test resources
After setting up and configuring your test environment,
your testers define what tests or groups of tests should
run on which systems. You can set up your hardware to
test a particular operating system, platform or browser.
Additionally, managing test lab resources by assigning
tests to individual systems helps to use your hardware
and network resources efficiently and effectively.
Run your manual tests
Running manual tests involves manually interacting
with an application then recording actual results
against expected outcomes. While some manual tests
are routine, they are an essential part of the testing
procedure, allowing your testers to verify functionality
and conditions that automated tools cannot handle.
Schedule automated test runs
After developing automated tests and assigning them
to host machines, your testing team needs to create an
execution schedule. Scheduling is another way to
avoid conflicts with hardware and system resources.
You can schedule tests to run unattended, overnight or
when a system is in least demand for other tasks.
Analyze your test-run results
When your tests execute, your testers uncover
application inconsistencies, broken functionality,
missing features and other problems commonly
referred to as “bugs” or “defects.” The next step is to
view the list of failed tests and determine what caused
a test to fail. If your tester determines that the test failed • Cosmetic or user interface
due to an application defect, you need to report this
defect into the defect tracking system for further
investigation, correction and re-testing.
Managing issues
Managing or “tracking” issues and defects is a critical
step in the testing process. As today’s systems become
more complex and mission critical, so does the severity
of the defects. A well-defined method for defect
management benefits not just the testing team.
Developers, managers, customer support, QA and
even beta customers can effectively contribute to the
testing process by having access to an open, easy-to-
use and functional defect-tracking system. The key to
making a good defect-reporting and resolution process
is to set up the defect workflow and assign permission
rules. In this way, your testers can define how a
lifecycle of a defect should progress and who has the
authority to open a new defect, who can change its
status to “fixed” and under what conditions the defect
can be closed. You should also maintain a complete
history and audit trail throughout the defect’s lifecycle.
Extra time spent on documenting the defect and its
history is often rewarded with easier analysis, shorter
resolution times and better application quality.
Analyzing defects helps your managers make “go/no-
go” decisions about application deployment. By
analyzing defect statistics, your testers can analyze
your applications and determine how many defects
they have and other related factors, such as their
status, severity, priority and age. By giving different
team members access to defect information, your
testers can greatly improve communication in your
organization and share the current status of your
applications.
Agree on a naming convention
Effective defect management relies upon
communication across the different parties involved in
the process. Before you establish reporting
mechanisms, your testing team needs to set the rules,
such as defining the severity of bugs, and agree on
what information must be included in the defect report.
For example, many testing organizations categorize
defects as follows:
• Inconsistency
• Loss of functionality
• System crash
• Loss of data
Cosmetic and inconsistency defects are the easiest to
report and address. Although they make the
application more difficult to use, they don’t affect the
application’s functionality. Defects that result in loss of
functionality are more severe and more urgently
require correction. Defects that cause the system to
crash or lose data are commonly called “showstoppers.”
You must document these types of defects as
thoroughly as possible and correct them before your
application goes live.
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Extra time spent on documenting a
defect and its history is often
rewarded by easier analysis, shorter
resolution times and better
application quality.

Establish reporting procedures group is pressured to release the next version of the
For good defect reporting, you need to supply your application, a project manager can decide to fix only
developers with the information they need to “show-stopper” defects and correct others after the
reproduce and fix a problem. A defect report generally release cycle. This process flow creates an
includes a summary and detailed description of the accountability chain, which defines who owns which
problem, version and system configuration information, defects and the status of the corrections.
the steps needed to reproduce the problem and any
Retest repairs
relevant information and attachments that help illustrate
After a known defect is repaired, you need to retest the
the issue.
application to see that the changes have taken effect
Set permission rules and that the correction did not introduce additional
Each step in the test management process requires problems and unexpected side effects.
different access privileges. This is especially true in
If the defect does not appear when you retest the
managing defects, as defect information helps your
application, you can change the status to “closed.”
managers make “go/no-go” decisions regarding
If the problem persists or the correction introduced
application release. Before the testing begins, your
additional problems, re-open the defect and repeat
testers must decide which team members have
the cycle.
permission to report, open or re-open defects, adjust
status and determine that a bug has been fixed and Analyze defects
is closed. Analyzing defects is critical. With analysis, your testers
can understand the application being tested and view
Establish the process flow
the number of known defects and related information,
After you find a defect, submit it into the defect
such as their status, severity, priority and age. Through
repository. A developer should review it and determine
defect analysis, your management can make an
whether the reported issue is indeed a defect. If so, the
informed decision whether an application is ready for
developer assigns it a “new” status. As few
deployment.
development organizations have the bandwidth to
repair all known defects, a developer or project
manager must prioritize them. If your development

9
Figure 1. Comprehensive testing.
HP Quality Center links test cases
to testing requirements and traces
the testing process.

HP Quality Center In today’s organizations, different groups are involved

software
HP Quality Center software is web-enabled, test
management software that supports the test
management process in one powerful, scalable and
flexible solution. It combines an integrated suite of role-
based modules, a business dashboard and an open,
scalable and extensible foundation—all designed to
optimize and automate key quality activities, including
requirements, test management and defects tracking,
functional testing and regression testing, and manual
and business-process testing. Seamless integration
among these modules provides smooth information
flow among the different stages of the testing process.
With HP Quality Center, you get enterprise-level
functionality that meets the needs of the most
sophisticated application testing projects.
in the testing process—managers, developers,
customer support, in-house and offshore teams and
even customers. By using a browser, all these groups
can easily access testing information and collaborate
seamlessly. In addition, HP Quality Center can
configure user groups and set up permissions to help
maintain access privileges and preserve information
integrity so that users see only the tests and assets that
are relevant to them. This functionality is particularly
beneficial for offshore testing projects.
The web-based software can also synchronize users
through version upgrades or installing new modules.
As a result, users no longer need to go offline during
upgrades. They simply refresh the browser and
synchronize with the rest of the organization.

Global, web-based test management

HP Quality Center is global test management
software. By being web-enabled, it supports
communication and collaboration among distributed
testing teams—whether they are located in different
parts of the world or separated by organizational
boundaries.

10
Requirements management At any stage in your testing process, HP Quality
Center can help your testers generate graphs and
The Requirements Management feature in HP Quality
reports quickly to gain accurate status information
Center links test cases to testing requirements,
about the tested application. For example, once you
providing traceability throughout the testing process.
complete your requirements, your testers can quickly
This lets users easily see what percentage of
extract information on what percentage of the
application functional requirements are covered by
requirements the tests address and what the status is of
tests, how many of these tests have run and how many
those tests. They can also extract information on how
have passed or failed.
many requirements were rejected in the review process
Developing testing requirements starts with reviewing and need to be repaired and which requirements have
the documentation for the application being tested, “urgent” priority and need to be validated as soon
including marketing and business requirements as possible.
documents, system requirements specifications and
With HP Quality Center, you can save all filters,
design documents. You can use these documents to
reports and graphs as “Favorites” for public or private
gain a thorough understanding of the application
access. Only the person who creates private favorite
being tested and to determine the testing scope: test
views can access them. Public favorites, however, can
goals, objectives and strategies.
be used by the entire team. For example, a manager
Based on the testing scope and goals, your QA needs to have updated information on the status of all
managers can begin developing requirements, log testing requirements for a particular application for a
them into the HP Quality Center requirements tree and weekly meeting. She only needs to create the report
assign responsibilities for specific areas. The once and save the filter under Favorites. From that
requirements tree is a graphical representation of your point on, HP Quality Center automatically updates her
organization’s specific requirements and displays the view with new information, and the manager gets an
hierarchical relationship among the different updated status of all requirements every week.
requirements. Each requirement in the tree is described
HP Quality Center also helps organizations maintain
in detail, such as the reviewed status, priority and
an audit trail by providing the history of any changes
creation date, and includes any relevant attachments.
made to a particular requirement. This helps preserve
Requirements Management provides two ways to link information integrity and allows your testers to trace
your requirements to tests: events throughout the requirement lifecycle—from initial
creation through changes to its status, priority or test
• Your testers can automatically generate tests based coverage.
on application requirements. Or, if they have an
existing test plan, they can link requirements to tests
that are associated with defects. In this way, your
testers can track their testing needs at all stages of
the testing process. If a testing requirement changes,
they can immediately identify which tests and defects
are affected, and who is responsible.
• Your testers can group and sort requirements in
the tree, monitor task allocation and the progress
of requirements and generate detailed reports
and graphs.

11
Figure 2. Graphically view your
test plans.
A test-plan tree in HP Quality
Center is a graphical
representation of your test plan.

Planning your tests In addition to supporting both manual and automated

tests, HP Quality Center supports the migration from
The test-plan tree in HP Quality Center is a graphical
manual to automated tests. If your testers automate a
representation of your test plan. It is a hierarchical list of
test, HP Quality Center creates a template for an
tests, organized according to topic, and describes the set
automated test based on the design steps. Your testers
of tests needed to meet your quality requirements. Your
only need an automated testing tool, such as HP
testers can also associate a test with specific defects. This
WinRunner software or HP QuickTest Professional
is useful, for example, when you create a new test for a
software, to record the business process and complete
known defect. Through association, your testers can
the test.
determine whether the test should run based on the status
of the defect. Before you execute your tests, you should review the test
plan to determine how well it meets the goals that your
HP Quality Center allows your testers to link each test in
testers defined at the beginning of the testing process.
the test-plan tree with a requirement in the requirements
They can analyze their test plan by generating
tree. By defining the requirements for a test, your testers
customizable reports and graphs. For example, they can
can track the relationship among the tests in the test plan
create a report that displays design step data for each
and the original testing requirements.
test in a test-plan tree. They can also use this report to
For each test, HP Quality Center helps your testers help determine their test design priorities.
create test steps that describe which operations to
As with reports and graphs in the requirements tab,
perform, what specific areas to check and which
testers can save their test plan views as Favorites and
results to expect. After your testers define the test steps,
access this information at any time.
they can decide whether to perform the test manually
or to automate it.

12
Figure 3. Run tests locally or
remotely.
With HP Quality Center, tests
can run locally or remotely on
any available system on the
network.

If your planning information is already stored in an
®
application, such as Microsoft Word or Excel, your
testers can reuse this information and import it into HP
Quality Center, preserving your investment and
eliminating the need for redundant planning efforts.
Additionally, HP Quality Center allows your testers to
create attachments so they can add information, such
as design documents or feature specifications, to a
specific test.
Running your tests
The Test Lab feature in HP Quality Center helps your
testing team manage the scheduling and running of
many different types of tests. To help organize the tests
that need to run, HP Quality Center uses the concept
of a “test set.” A test set is a group of tests in a project
database, designed to achieve specific testing goals.
Test sets can include all tests that validate specific
functionality, such as a log-in process, or that verify an
application works with a particular version of a browser.
With HP Quality Center, you can add tests to a test set
from the planning tree by dragging and dropping.
Your testers can also create a filter inside the planning
tree and export it into a test set for all tests that satisfy
specified criteria.
In addition, your testers can define the execution
conditions and control the execution of automated tests
in a test set. They can set conditions and schedule the
date and time for executing automated tests. They can
also set the sequence in which to execute the tests.
For example, to verify a simple business process in which
the user logs into a system, creates a reservation, enters
payment information and logs out, you can create four
modular tests: “Log-in,” “Create Reservation,” “Insert
Payment” and “Log-out.” To emulate this simple business
process, you can arrange the four tests sequentially,
beginning with “Log-in” and followed by “Create
Reservation,” “Insert Payment” and “Log-out.”
You can also define the execution conditions. In this
example, you can set the “Create Reservation” test to
run only after the “Log-in” test passes. The “Log-out”
test, on the other hand, can run regardless of whether
the previous test passes or fails. For example, you can
set “Log-out” to run after “Insert Payment” has finished,
regardless of the result.

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Figure 4. Analyze application
defects.
The Defect Management module
in HP Quality Center logs, tracks,
manages and analyzes
application defects.

With HP Quality Center, your testers can run tests Managing issues
locally or remotely on any available system on the
Information about issues or defects is critical for
network. Through the Host Manager feature, they can
determining the status of an application and deciding
define the systems for running tests and group them by
whether it is ready for deployment. The Defect
task (functional or load testing), operating system
Management feature in HP Quality Center logs, tracks,
(Windows® or UNIX®), browser type and version
manages and analyzes application defects. Different
(Netscape or Internet Explorer) or by any other
types of users—testers, project managers, developers,
specification or configuration.
beta customers and many others—can use it to enter
HP Quality Center is tightly integrated with other HP defects directly into the database.
quality management offerings. You can also use its
An effective defect-tracking process is firmly rooted in
open API to run tests using a third-party testing tool.
the concepts of well-defined workflow and permission
Your testers can schedule automated tests to run
rules. Your testers can define how a defect should
unattended, either overnight or when the test lab
progress through its lifecycle—from initial problem
systems are in least demand for other tasks. Using its
detection through solving the problem and verifying the
scheduling mechanism, HP Quality Center invokes the
correction—as well as set permission rules and access
automated testing tool, runs your tests and reports
privileges for any member of the organization.
results back into the central repository.

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Using customization options, you can establish the
workflow rules that are most appropriate for your
process. For example, a defect must start its cycle with
the status “new.” It cannot be closed without a QA
manager reviewing it first, then it transfers to the
development team. A developer either rejects the
defect or corrects the problem and assigns a new
status, “fixed.” The defect remains open until the
project manager reviews the corrections and changes
the status to “closed.” By setting the workflow and
permission rules for different members of the team, you
can configure HP Quality Center to reflect your process
flow and organizational requirements.
Share customizable analysis tools
Based on organizational roles, you can restrict
individuals from viewing certain records in the defect-
tracking process. For example, you can restrict some
developers to viewing only defects that have been
assigned to them. Similarly, you can block beta
customers who have access to the defect database
from viewing the “target fix date” for any defect.
Your testers can attach information to a defect, such as
a description file or a view of the application being
tested, to help illustrate a problem. To further help
development reproduce the issue, your testers can
attach information about all system components, such
as memory, operating system or color settings.
Attached as a text file, all this data can help reproduce
the problem and accelerate problem resolution.
The filters, reports, graphs and favorites in the Defect
Management feature in HP Quality Center can help
assess whether an application is ready to be deployed
by answering the following questions. Are your testers
finding more defects than they are fixing? Are your
developers overloaded with too many urgent bugs
assigned to them? Are there more defects in the current
version of the application than in the previous release?
All of this information is available through the
customizable analysis tools and can be shared across
the organization.
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 Summary
The application-testing process is unique for every
organization. However, many testing teams follow a
similar methodology that includes identifying the
functional requirements, creating a test plan, running
tests and tracking application defects. This approach
to testing requires powerful software that can promote
communication and collaboration among teams, while
adding organization and structure to the testing
process. HP offers global test management with HP
Quality Center. By integrating requirements
management with test planning, test scheduling, test
execution and defect tracking in a single web-based
application, HP Quality Center streamlines and
accelerates the testing process.

To learn more, visit www.hp.com/go/software

© 2007 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. The only warranties for HP
products and services are set forth in the express warranty statements accompanying such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as
constituting an additional warranty. HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.
Microsoft and Windows are U.S. registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group.
4AA1-2314ENW, May 2007