Irrespective of the Development models used in the projects (Water fall, V-model or Agile models), all them will have minimum the following phases. Requirements analysis (called user stores in agile), Design, Coding, Testing and Implementation. HP QC facilitates for all STLC (software test life cycle) activities, i.e., test requirements -> planned test cases -> Run test cases -> Defects.
Once a user logs into the Quality Centre, he/she could see the main components which are Releases, Requirements, Test Plan, Test Lab and Defects. If the user also has a license for Business Component Module, one could see that as well.
Let us brief on the each of the modules.
Releases Module facilitates the project team to create a specific project releases (e.g., Enhancements, service packs). Each of the releases can have multiple cycles depending on the project timelines.
Release –>
Cycle 1
Cycle 2
……
……
Cycle n
Requirements Module allows the user (mostly Business analyst or QA tester) to enter all the requirements from the Business Requirement Document.
Test plan Module allows the tester to write all corresponding test cases for the requirements. All the test cases can be grouped in a tree structure. Each of the test can have the states as defined the QC admin. The actual manual test cases (step by step) will be created in the “Design Steps” tab.
Test Lab Module allows the tester to group/categorize the related the tests into “Test Set” by selecting tests from Test Plan module. These will be actual tests that will be run/executed in when the Build of AUT (Application Under Test) is available to the tester.
Defects Module is the place where the tester starts logging or recording all the failed test case results (it could be any kinds of issues, problems or error message once a test case fails or even it could be a defect raised during ad-hoc, monkey or exploratory testing).
The mandatory fields that are required to raise a defect are defined by QC admin. It can be customized by QC admin as per Organization or project needs. One important feature that is very useful is the “Camera” icon which can be just dragged and drop on to the AUT to capture screenshot of the test result.
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Test Plan Module in QC
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Part1 (Introduction):
In this article you as a tester will learn about how to use “test plan tool bar” to create manual tests in the “Test Plan” module. Test Plan is a component (or module) of HPQC where the tests can be created and stored.
Note: Test cases are called Tests in HP QC and throughout this article, the term “Test” has been used to represent “Manual test case”.
The test creation workflow is as followsNavigate to Test Plan > Create Test Folders > Create Tests > Write Detailed Test Steps
Navigating to Test Plan:
Once you login to HP QC, click on the “Test Plan” button
on the left navigation menu that will take you the “Test Plan” Module.
Test Plan Tree: HPQC allows the tester to create all the tests according to functionalities of the AUT (Application Under Test) and logically group them into the Test folder. The sub folders can also be created under the main folder. The tester will have the flexibility to create or define the folder structure in such a way that it would be possible for tests to be grouped as per test cycles, for e.g., System Testing, Integration Testing etc.
Subject: is the highest folder (root folder) in the Test plan, under which all the test folders can be created.
Unattached: is the folder which contains all tests that are deleted from a test folder. For now, just analogize (consider) it as “Recycle bin”.
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Part 2 (Test Plan Tool Bar):
This tool bar contains the buttons for frequently used actions while creating a test tree or hierarchy.
New Folder: allows you to create the main folder (parent) for all your tests.
New Test: allows you to create the test in the test folder.
Delete: allows you to delete the folder or test from the tree, except the root (subject) and Unattached folder.
Refresh All: refreshes the entire test tree structure so that recently added or deleted or updated tests and test folders are displayed properly.
Set Filter/Sort: allows you to filter and display only the specified tests based on the conditions set. Also, it allows the tests to be sorted in descending or ascending order as defined.
By choosing the second option (Clear Filter/Sort) in the drop down list of the same button, you can remove the filter conditions and sort criteria.
Convert to Component: allows you to convert existing manual tests into business component.
Sort folders: opens the “Sort Folders in Test Plan Tree” dialog box and allows you to custom sort the folders. By default, folders are sorted by name.
Flag for follow up: opens the “Flag For Follow Up” dialog box and you can add, modify or clear flag for a test. Note: Quality Center allows you to add your own alerts known as “Flag for Follow Up”, to remind yourself to follow up on something. (For example, you can set a flag for reminding yourself about getting tests reviewed by the Business Analyst at a future date)
Send by E-Mail: allows you to email the selected test to the selected recipient (project team members as in HPQC) or to any other email addresses. By choosing the 2nd option (Send by Email to Designer) in the drop down list of the same button, you can send the test to the Designer who created it originally.
Text Search: Opens the “Text search pane” in the lower part of the window, and allows you to search for “string” or “text” in “Tests” or “Design steps”.Part 3 (Creating Test Folders and Tests):
This is part 3 of our series of articles on Test plan module in Quality Center. In this part we “ll see how we can create tests folders and tests under Test plan module.
Step 1: Place your mouse cursor on the “Subject” folder in Test Plan.
Step 2: Click on the New Folder button
, to create the main folder for your AUT.Step 3: This will open a dialog box “New Folder”.
Step 4: Type the folder name that you wish in the “Text Field” and click “OK” to save the folder name.
In the above screenshot, a generic name as “AUT” has been used. You could use any name depending on the application or system you are testing. (for example: Flight Reservation System, Banking Software, Order Management system, Hospital Management, Library management software etc).
(Note for all the dialog boxes: Clicking on “Cancel” button or “X” (Close) button would close the relevant dialog box and the action will not be performed (in this case, the test folder will not be created. Clicking on “Help” button would open the “HP QC Help Window”)
After clicking on “OK”, a test folder called “AUT” would be created under “Subject” folder as in below screenshot.
Step 5: Repeat step 2 to 4, to create the sub folders as you wish, to group different types of tests together. (For example, see the following screenshot)
Step 6: Click on the “New Test” button
to create test in the selected test folder. By Default “Test Type” selected will be “Manual”. Type appropriate “Test Name” in the edit field and click “OK”.
A test with Manual Test Icon
will be created.
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