If testing of the Priority 1 features impacts adequate testing of these, they may be dropped from the product. Specific testing based on new features or functions defined as Development Priority 3. Software Quality Assurance will not schedule or plan for these features. However, Priority 3 completed prior to Functional Freeze will be added to the SQA Priority 2 for testing and appropriate risk assessment will be taken with respect their inclusion in the released product. SQA has its own set of Priority 1, Priority 2, Priority 3, which include not only the Development activities, but also testing required as due diligence for product verification prior to shipment.
Products being distributed over the Web, also have their Web download and installation verified.
The SQA engineers, like the customers whom they attempt to emulate, are isolated from the source code and must rely upon their understanding of the application and its features and functions. SQA engineers work with Development engineers toward development of code which lends itself to the exercise of automated test tools, thus providing for stable, repeatable, reliable testing of base features and functions. The deductive, reasoning, creative skills of the SQA engineers are thus freed from the more repetitive tasks to focus on development of more user centric testing, which expands the scope covera ge. This is then passed on to the Tools engineer to automate for new builds and regression testing. Defects are entered into the bugs tracking database, for investigation and resolution.