This post was created in a paid cooperation with Tricentis.
Software development projects are becoming more and more complex. They rely on different development toolkits and frameworks, and are interconnected with many other internal and external systems via an API.
At the same time the software development release cycle is getting shorter and shorter and companies release multiple times a day. And customers expect a perfect software product.
The technical challenges as well as the customer expectations make the lives of people working in the software development team not easy. To release a product with confidence a software development company needs to implement quality processes as well as a quality mindset of everybody involved.
To keep an overview on the overall quality of a product, companies rely on test management software. Next to a test management software, companies usually have a project management software in place like Jira. Jira is used by over 180,000 customers in 190 countries and is the de facto industry standard to organize modern software projects.
However companies struggle to combine their testing activities from a test management tool to their project management software like Jira.
If you or your company is struggling the same way, this article might be of interest to you.
A couple of weeks ago I was already posting about Tricentis Test Management for Jira on my social media accounts. Test Management for Jira is a Jira plug-in that offers powerful test management capabilities in your Jira projects.
The claim of the plug-in is:
End-to-end test management inside Jira to help QA, development, and the entire business drive quality as one team
I really liked that claim and it made me curious to find out more about the plugin.
Tricentis Test Management for Jira
You can install the plugin directly from the Atlassian marketplace with the following link.
After the installation of Test Management for Jira, the plugin is available for all your Jira projects in the apps section. If you are using the plugin for the first time, there are 3 easy steps to perform in order to configure the plugin.
- Download issue type icons for Requirements and Test cases
- Create 2 new issue types (Requirements and Test cases)
- Select the region you are working in
Once you have completed the setup you can start using the plugin. The plugin has a really simple structure. It has 4 sections, Requirements, Test Design, Test Execution and Reports.
Requirements Section
In the requirements section you can define your product requirements. If you are familiar with modern software development practices, the requirements usually come from the stakeholders or the product owner of your team or department. What I really like about the requirements section is that the requirements are close to the test cases, the execution and the reporting in Test Management for Jira. Usually the requirements are written down in Epics or User Stories in Jira and are not always directly connected or linked to any testing activities. With the help of the plugin this process is getting more transparent for the people involved in the process. While using the plugin I noticed that the requirement issue type is not mandatory. If your project is using user stories or epics, you can also use them to link the test cases from the plugin to it. However, if you consider using the plugin I highly recommend using the requirements tab too. It makes your life much easier.
Test Design Section
In the test design section you can write your test cases with all the information needed to execute the tests later in the execution phase. You can add test data, exact test steps as well as a description to it. Each test case can be linked to a requirement to see if you have covered all acceptance criteria.
Also in this section you can create folders. With the help of the folders you can cluster your test cases for example in different product areas for a much better usability.
Directly from the folders you can create a test run to jump right into the test execution.
Test Execution Section
In the test execution section you can create the test runs structured in test cycles. With a view clicks a test cycle is created. In a new test cycle you can create new test runs with the previous created test cases.
In the test cycle you can then start the execution of the test cases.
What I really like in the execution phase is that you can add comments to each test case step in case there is something not clear. It can also be used to add a remark for yourself to follow up on the topic after the test run.
Once you have found an issue, you can directly create a bug report from the test step.
The created bug will be in your Jira project for further tracking but will also appear in your test pad of the executed test cycle.
Reports Section
The last section of the plugin is the reports sections. I think you can also guess what’s behind it :). Yes, all kinds of insightful data.
You can get a summary of your tests, the execution progress with detailed information on how many tests have passed, failed, are blocked, are in progress and how many tests haven’t been executed yet.
Takeaways
Using the Test Management for Jira plugin is very easy. From the setup to the creation of the first test case it only takes a few minutes. I really like the intuitive user interface of the plugin. I have not read any documentation before I was using the plugin and it was self explanatory to me. I was able to define requirements, create test cases and link them to the requirements. Also the test execution is easy to plan and to perform. The metrics are really helpful to get an overview of the current state of the product and the overall quality.
What I really like about the plugin is the fact that this plugin is not only for testers or developers who are executing the tests. No, it’s really helpful for all people involved in the development process. Business people can get an easy overview of the current state of the product using the reports section. And even more important is the fact that product owners can work on their product requirements together with the whole team in one space and to link the testing activities directly from the plugin.
The lightweight plugin helps teams to focus on the product development without getting distracted in handling multiple tools at the same time. This is a huge uplift in productivity!
If you want to see Tricentis Test Management for Jira in action, check out my YouTube channel. I created a video, where I am explaining the features of the plugin.
#HappyTesting
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