Requirements Analysis
The following test activities
should be performed during this stage:
1.1 Invest in analysis at the beginning of the
project - Having a clear, concise and formal statement of the requirements
facilitates prigramming communication, error
analysis and test data generation.
The requirements statement should
record the following information and decisions:
a. Program function - What the program must do?
b. The form, format,
data
types and units for input.
c. The form, format, data types and units for output.
d. How exceptions, errors and deviations are to be handled.
e. For scientific computations, the numerical method or at least the required
accuracy of the solution.
f. The hardware/software environment required or assumed (e.g. the machine, the
operating
system, and the implementation
language).
Deciding the above issues is one of the activities related to testing that
should be performed during this stage.
1.2 Start developing the test set at the
requirements analysis phase - Data should be generated that can be used to
determine whether the requirements have been met. To do this, the input
domain should be partitioned into
classes of values that the program will treat in a similar manner and for each
class a representative element should be included in the test data.
In addition, following should also
be included in the data set:
(1) boundary values
(2) any non-extreme input values that would require special handling.
The output domain should be treated similarly.
Invalid input requires the same analysis as valid input.
1.3 The correctness, consistency and completeness of the requirements should
also be analyzed - Consider whether the correct problem is being solved, check
for conflicts and inconsistencies among the requirements and consider the
possibility of missing cases.
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