What is Test Management?
Test Management is defined as the planning, coordination and monitoring of all test activities in a software project to ensure the quality of the end product. It is a comprehensive process that combines various aspects to enable reliable and high-performance software development. Test management tasks include
- Resource management, ensuring that all required resources such as time, personnel and tools are utilised effectively,
- monitoring test execution and progress to ensure that all test phases are completed on time and in full,
- managing defects, including recording, prioritising and tracking them,
- risk management, which identifies potential problems at an early stage and takes measures to minimise them,
- and the analysis of test results in order to make informed decisions about the release or optimisation of the software.
In our definition, test management thus ensures that tests are carried out efficiently and effectively, optimises the test processes and guarantees that the software meets the specified quality requirements.
Challenges in Test Management
- Unclear goals and requirements
Missing or changing requirements make planning more difficult and lead to gaps in test coverage. - Mangelnde Transparenz und Nachvollziehbarkeit
Teststatus, Abdeckung und Risiken sind schwer greifbar; Entscheidungen im Freigabeprozess werden oft ohne belastbare Daten getroffen. - Lack of transparency and traceability
Specialist testers, developers and automation engineers do not work together smoothly – communication and handovers get stuck. - High manual effort and tool breaks
Many work steps are not automated, tools are not well integrated, information is spread across many systems. - Time pressure and prioritization problems
Tests come under pressure due to tight release cycles, important tests are left undone, errors appear late or only at the customer’s premises.
How does Test Management work with TestBench?
TestBench offers a comprehensive solution for the challenges of test management. The software enables structured planning, organisation and monitoring of test processes, which ensures that all requirements are fully covered by tests. TestBench helps to recognise errors at an early stage and reduce the testing effort by efficiently managing test results and errors. The software also supports the approval process with automatic reports and metrics and facilitates collaboration with external parties. The following functions support you in your project:
Allocating and distributing resources
From the overarching test topic to the individual test case, team members can be entered as responsible parties. In addition, reviewers for test specifications and test automation can be defined so that these elements are subject to a dual control principle.
With the help of filters, users can determine which tests are due for review within the next five days.
Fast analyses
Specific questions or analyses can be easily answered or created using filters. Almost all information from TestBench can be included in the definition of a filter. In addition, customised fields and the setting of markers significantly expand these options. This means that queries can be carried out quickly and easily, even with large amounts of data.
Quick overview and easy progress monitoring
The distribution of the status of test specification, test automation and test execution is permanently available and is updated immediately and automatically in the event of changes. The distributions are available for individual areas, so-called test topics or for entire (sub-)projects.
This makes it easy to recognise problems in planning, progress and error frequency.
Measure coverage of requirements
Requirements from connected requirements management tools can be linked directly to the corresponding tests. This makes it possible to precisely check the coverage of the requirements, track changes and their effects on the tests and keep an eye on the current test result status at all times.
Traceability
Traceability plays a crucial role in test management in order to ensure the connection between requirements, test specifications, test executions and errors found. Thanks to TestBench, all relevant elements can be linked together, ensuring complete traceability. This transparency makes it possible to take targeted measures to rectify errors and ensure that requirements are covered. In this way, traceability not only supports quality assurance, but also the efficiency of the entire test process.
Changes to mass data
In TestBench, tests are organised in test topic trees, which can be interpreted in a similar way to chapters in a document or directory trees. Many elements can be subjected to mass data changes across these test topic trees. Active filters and locks can also be used for targeted changes when transferring data.
Providing reports and analyses
TestBench prepares the data using numerous templates for reports and analyses. These templates are flexibly customisable and offer an open provision of all analyses. This ensures that test results are analysed transparently, while reports can be presented clearly and effortlessly.
Avoidance of formal errors
Analyses enable effective monitoring of the conventions to be adhered to and reliably uncover violations of rules and process specifications. The result is consistent and rule-compliant data in TestBench that can be easily exported as reports – without the need for time-consuming reviews to ensure their correctness (see Static analysis.)
All advantages at a glance
