Welcome to the 237th issue!

Today, I want to share with you this big discussion on Reddit:

What are your biggest pain points in QA?

What surprised me is that many testers mentioned (or upvoted) unrealistic expectations, unclear requirements and a lack of shared responsibility for quality.

Why? Because these are not issues with testing per se, but with leadership and collaboration.

If you face similar challenges, it's probably worth raising them with your manager at the next opportunity.

Happy testing!

Dawid Dylowicz  

The Next Generation of Testing: Leaving Quality Center Behind

Is ALM Quality Center holding back your testing processes? Step into the future with PractiTest's upcoming webinar! Discover how modern testing tools can offer better efficiency, improved workflows, and enhanced quality. Join us to learn how you can transition smoothly from Quality Center to next-gen testing solutions. Register today!

practitest.com  

Developing a Software Quality Strategy

This is a good high-level overview by Summer Weisberg of what steps are needed to create a software quality strategy including metrics, methodologies and processes.

testlio.com  

How I Revolutionized Our Sprint Completion with One Key Mindset Shift

In relation to another post from last week's newsletter, Kandyce Houston shares some good advice on introducing the test-first approach to sprints.

medium.com  

What Does a Bug Count Mean?

Bug count by itself is a dangerous metric. Kristin Jackvony explains why we should approach it with caution, taking into account different scenarios.

thinkingtester.com  

Why So Many Clicks And How Can Testing And Automation Help?

Paul Grizzaffi shares his experience with reducing the number of clicks in a test automation platform and how that relates to user experience.

In relation to that, Ryan Welch points out: Relying on AI for QA? Here's Why You’re Missing the Point.

wordpress.com  

Writing test cases is driving me insane

Dealing with a lot of changing requirements and needing to rewrite test cases? Testers advise what to do in such situation.

It may help to create a Decision Table Testing: Best Practices for Effective Test Design, as Bahadir Kucukuysal explains.

reddit.com  

Advancing efficiency in Test Automation

Wondering how to make your automated tests better? Anji Boddupally gives a few handy tips with examples.

Similarly, Chamila Ambahera shares the Best Practices for UI Test Automation Frameworks.

medium.com  

AI-Assisted Software Development: A Comprehensive Guide with Practical Prompts (Part 3/3)

In the third part of the series, Aalap Davjekar explores how AI can enhance testing processes, optimise for better performance and assist with version control. Prompt examples included!

medium.com  

Let Your Tests Do The Talking: Listen to Their Feedback!

Instead of merely looking at the pass rates, Rafael Miguel advises digging deeper into what tests really tell us when they fail.

substack.com  

Test Automation Roadmap: Multi-team

Continuing the great series on different approaches to test automation, this time Sander van Beek describes what characterises a multi-team mindset and when it's the most effective.

medium.com  

The EuroSTAR 2025 Call for Speakers is now open — Speak on Europe’s largest testing stage!

What learnings can you share with Europe’s most global gathering of software testers? The theme 'AI on Trial: Exploring the Art of Testing AI' will also cover the wider topics and challenges faced by our community. See the full list of topics on the EuroSTAR website.

Submit before October 13th!

eurostarsoftwaretesting.com  

Embarking on the great migration: From Selenium to Playwright

Wondering what it's like to move from Selenium to Playwright? Niranjan Veluru describes several lessons learned from their journey.

medium.com  

How To Debug Cypress Tests In 4 Ways With Examples

Uros Simic demonstrates the debugging techniques for Cypress tests that can help you investigate the failures.

You might also want to learn from Gleb Bahmutov about Skipping Dependent Cypress Tests On Failure.

qa-essentials.com  

Running Cypress in parallel using GitHub actions

One of the biggest limitations of the open-source version of Cypress is that it doesn't support parallelisation. However, there's an easy workaround using CI, as Juraj Šimon shows.

hashnode.dev  

Timeouts Against Flaky Tests: True Cases with Playwright

In some scenarios, Playwright tests can be flaky, too. Andrey Enin gives three examples and offers a controversial, but effective solution using timeouts.

Furthermore, Ravi Kiran showcases the Effective Utilization of Playwright Fixtures.

medium.com  

Web Accessibility: A step-by-step guide to Testing with pa11y

Pa11y is a helpful open-source tool for scanning web apps for accessibility issues. Razvan Vancea wrote a short guide on how to set up and use it.

Moreover, Irfan Mujagić describes Testing Focus Order and Visibility for WCAG Compliance.

razvanvancea.ro  

Learning Resources for Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is one of the best soft skills that can help testers become more effective and here's a good list of resources on this topic prepared by Balaji Santhanagopalan.

bjtestingtalks.in  

API Security Quick Start: Bas Dijkstra

Wondering how to test your API for security? Nikolay Advolodkin invited Bas Dijkstra to tell us more about it.

youtube.com  

Understanding and working with Page Object Model in Selenium with Java

In this 32-minute video, Karthik K.K explains in detail what Page Object Model is and how to apply it in practice using Selenium with Java as an example.

The series continues with two more recently released recordings on Page Object Model with PageFactory and @FindBy and Page Object Model and custom methods.

youtube.com  

Testing with a bias... 😂

Thanks for reading!

If you like this newsletter and it helps you become a better tester, you can say thanks and buy me a coffee.

Dawid Dylowicz