Practical QA Testing in a Configurable World

Joe Burns

In today’s world there are many systems that are being configured to adapt to ever changing business conditions. The solutions include the use of SOA architecture and commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) software. In this presentation, Joe Burns will walk you through the appropriate techniques and approaches for testing these types of systems. A customer case study will be included.

Joe Burns has over 20 years experience developing and implementing products and services for the quality assurance industry. He is an entrepreneur and enjoys building world class QA solutions. He has successfully founded and developed testing products which are integrated with companies like IBM, TIBCO, and webMethods. He is one of only a handful of people that developed a startup product that is now being commercially sold all over the world. This product is currently on the Gartner's Magic Quadrant for Integration Testing. He is an expert in QA tools and processes and enjoys sharing his real life experiences with his audience.

Capers Jones is Chief Scientist Emeritus of Software Productivity Research (SPR). Mr. Jones is the designer of several software cost and quality estimation tools including SPQR/20™, the first commercial software estimating tool to use function points as the basis for sizing source code and other deliverables such as specifications and user documents. He is also an international consultant on software management topics, a speaker, a seminar leader, and a prolific author. As an author, Mr. Jones has written 14 books including his best seller "Applied Software Measurement: Assuring Productivity and Quality." His most recent book is "Estimating Software Costs."

Dr. Herb Krasner is a senior faculty member at the University of Texas at Austin, and the Director of the Software Engineering Industry Affiliates Program. He is best known for his leading edge work on modeling the costs of software quality, reporting the ROI data for software process improvement, coaching organizational improvement programs and reporting the results from his empirical studies of professional programmers. He has published over 55 papers, articles and book sections and has been lead CMM assessor on over 40 CMM capability assessments.

Beth Layman has more than 20 years of experience in the software industry as a senior manager and professional consultant. Her work experience encompasses a wide range of markets and industries including commercial, government, aerospace, IT services, and product software organizations. Beth has provided process improvement-related training, assessments and consulting services, using various models including CMMI, and is an SEI SCAMPI Authorized Lead Assessor. Beth is a recognized authority on software measurement and quality management, and is a co-author of Practical Software Measurement: Objective Information for Decision Makers.

Gary Gack, is the founder and President of Process-Fusion.net, a provider of Assessments, Strategy advice, Training, and Coaching relating to integration and deployment of software and IT best practices. Mr. Gack holds an MBA from the Wharton School, is a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt and an ASQ Certified Software Quality Engineer. He has more than 40 years of diverse experience, including more than 20 years focused on process improvement. He is the author of many articles and a book entitled Managing the Black Hole: The Executive’s Guide to Software Project Risk. LinkedIn profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/garygack.