Test Strategy Guidelines

In order to make the most of our test strategy, we need to make it reusable and manageable. To that end, there are some essential guiding principles we should follow when developing our overall test strategy:

• Test automation is a fulltime effort, not a sideline.
• The test design and the test framework are totally separate entities.
• The test framework should be application-independent.
• The test framework must be easy to expand, maintain, and perpetuate.
• The test strategy/design vocabulary should be framework independent.
• The test strategy/design should remove most testers from the complexities of the test framework.

These ideals are not earth shattering. They are not relatively new. Yet, it is seldom these principles are fully understood and instrumented.