Date: Sunday 24th January 2016
Time: 3.30pm – 5.30pm GMT
Facilitators: Amy Phillips
Good testing relies on using the right tool at the right time. We’re not talking about automated tests, although those are important too. Instead we’re talking about all those little tools and tricks you use to make your testing effective, and efficient. Your “Swiss Army knife” of testing tools.
In this session we talked about tools. We had browser extensions, security tools, image capturing software, test data creation and lots more (scroll down to see our list). The most interesting thing was just how many of our tools were around taking simple notes to help us plan and report on our testing.
Emma keaveny even went as far as naming pen and paper as her only must have tools.
We named (probably amongst others) the following tools:
Test Reporting / note taking:
Microsoft Word
Evernote
OneNote
TextEdit or Gedit for note taking in Linux usually
Geany
RapidReporter
Jira
Pen and paper
Screenshots:
greenshot on win platform
shutter for linux are great to take screenshots and add some edits (arrows, explanation, etc..).
Jing
Lightshot
SnagIt
Recording:
Psr (problem steps recorder) within windows
QuickTime or screenflow for recording videos of issues
Mindmapping:
xmind
mindmup
Mural
TestData Generation:
Perlclip
Test Management:
testrail
Log analysis:
mobaxterm
baretail
http://logio.org ..was free and useful for testers
Security:
Kali
ZAP
securityheaders.io
Autohotkey for automating some of the basic workflow
The conversation was fast paced so I’m sure there were plenty more tools mentioned. Take a look through the full transcript to find more!
The following additional resources were mentioned during the session.
Elisabeth Hendrickson’s Cheat Sheet
Stephen Janaway’s extensive list of browser extensions
James Bach talking about about his tools and automation.
Gojko Adzic named a LOT of things, tools in this article.
As always, thanks to everyone who joined us for this session.
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Amy has spent the last ten years testing in a variety of development environments for companies including Royal Mail, The Guardian, and Yahoo! She is currently test lead at Songkick and enjoying the challenges of mobile and web testing.
You can find Amy on Twitter (@itjustbroke) or via testingthemind.wordpress.com