How to Test a Spoon?

How to Test a Spoon - Adventures in QA

A couple of months ago I stumbled up on a blog post or tweet (Sorry, but I really can’t remember and find it again) about a very funny and interesting software testing interview question.
The question is:

How to Test a Spoon?

This question sounds strange in the first place, but if you think about it, it is a brilliant software testing question. But why?
The goal of this question is not to see the possible candidate to break the spoon, instead it is more about the reaction and the thinking process about this question.

I would love to get some questions back from the candidate to see how he or she will get more information out of this testing challenge.

Some brilliant answers would be:

  • What is the purpose of this spoon?
    • Will it be used as a normal spoon for soup or will it be used for example in a chemical environment for acid liquids?
  • What is the area of operation of this spoon?
    • Will it be used in a hot or cold environment?
  • What material is it made of?
    • Is it made of plastic, metal or wood?
  • What is the shape of the spoon?
    • Is the shape important for the use case of this spoon? Maybe it has a square, round or rectangle shape.
  • Who will use it? Children, adults or older people?
    • Are there sharp edges, are those edges intended to be sharp?

I will ask this question in one of my next software testing interviews, if you were lucky enough you have read this post before :).

But please just hand out a spoon no fork or knife, for your own safety :).

What do you think about this question? Will you use it in one of your upcoming interviews or do you have some similar questions?

Happy Testing!

Image Source: https://openclipart.org/image/300px/svg_to_png/206173/1418358989.png