Development directions in software testing and quality assurance

Abstract

In software engineering, testing and quality assurance activities are characterised as important yet costly phases of a product’s life cycle. On the one hand, quality issues or malfunctioning products can cause expensive and potentially irreversible damage; on the other hand, rigorous quality assurance work is time-consuming and limited by the available resources. For this reason, companies aim to automate their testing and quality assurance processes as much as possible. In the modern software production environment, the use of automation, tools and even artificial intelligence is constantly evolving. Given the rapid pace of evolution, studying industry practices and observing practitioners in action is paramount for software engineering research.

This thesis investigates current practices and future development directions in testing and quality assurance work. First, a survey method is used to map the current practices. Then, the thesis utilises an empirical approach to explore novel approaches for automating quality assurance tasks. These approaches are then evaluated using the design science research method. Finally, the survey results are used to create a testing education curriculum aligned with industry practices.

As a result, the thesis presents a holistic overview of testing and quality assurance practices, tools and education. An overview of the current tools in the industry is presented, in addition to conclusions about the trends and issues related to testing. Following the issues identified in the survey, a novel tool—.Maintain—is constructed and evaluated as one solution to the runtime monitoring of software projects. The last contribution is a curriculum, learning activities and learning objectives for testing education to produce more industry-ready graduates.