A test process consists of the following main groups of activities:
- Test planning
- Test monitoring and control
- Test analysis
- Test design
- Test implementation
- Test execution
- Test completion
Each main group of activities is composed of constituent activities, which will be described in the subsections below. Each constituent activity consists of multiple individual tasks, which would vary from one project or release to another. Further, although many of these main activity groups may appear logically sequential, they are often implemented iteratively. For example, Agile development involves small iterations of software design, build, and test that happen on a continuous basis, supported by on-going planning. So test activities are also happening on an iterative, continuous basis within this software development approach. Even in sequential software development, the stepped logical sequence of main groups of activities will involve overlap, combination, concurrency, or omission, so tailoring these main groups of activities within the context of the system and the project is usually required.
Test planning involves activities that define the objectives of testing and the approach for meeting test objectives within constraints imposed by the context (e.g., specifying suitable test techniques and tasks, and formulating a test schedule for meeting a deadline). Test plans may be revisited based on feedback from monitoring and control activities.
Test monitoring involves the on-going comparison of actual progress against planned progress using any test monitoring metrics defined in the test plan. Test control involves taking actions necessary to meet the objectives of the test plan (which may be updated over time). Test monitoring and control are supported by the evaluation of exit criteria, which are referred to as the definition of done in some software development lifecycle models (see ISTQB-CTFL-AT)
Test progress against the plan is communicated to stakeholders in test progress reports, including deviations from the plan and information to support any decision to stop testing.
During test analysis, the test basis is analyzed to identify testable features and define associated test conditions. In other words, test analysis determines “what to test” in terms of measurable coverage criteria.
The application of black-box, white-box, and experience-based test techniques can be useful in the process of test analysis to reduce the likelihood of omitting important test conditions and to define more precise and accurate test conditions.
In some cases, test analysis produces test conditions which are to be used as test objectives in test charters. Test charters are typical work products in some types of experience-based testing. When these test objectives are traceable to the test basis, coverage achieved during such experience-based testing can be measured.
The identification of defects during test analysis is an important potential benefit, especially where no other review process is being used and/or the test process is closely connected with the review process. Such test analysis activities not only verify whether the requirements are consistent, properly expressed, and complete, but also validate whether the requirements properly capture customer, user, and other stakeholder needs. For example, techniques such as behavior driven development (BDD) and acceptance test driven development (ATDD), which involve generating test conditions and test cases from user stories and acceptance criteria prior to coding. These techniques also verify, validate, and detect defects in the user stories and acceptance criteria (see ISTQB-CTFL-AT).