The Development of a Thorough Test Plan in the Analysis Phase Leading to more Successful Software Development Projects

Abstract

A critical problem in many software development projects is missing some important requirements until late in the development life cycle. Building a thorough test plan very early in the product development cycle has the potential for early discovery of missing requirements with attendant reduction in project costs and schedule improvement. Key to the success of this approach is the understanding that mature tests often go beyond the documented requirements for applications and into exploring the boundaries of the application domain where missing requirements are often uncovered. In addition, the test methodology of looking at features from multiple users' perspectives and less common use cases, shed light on misinterpreted and/or misunderstood requirements.