uTest, the world’s largest software testing marketplace, is launching Version 4.0 of its software testing platform– the company’s most significant update in more than a year.  In addition to an improved user interface, this version incorporates two major features designed to provide tighter integration between the testing community and our customers’ engineering teams: Bug Fix Verification and Test Case Support.

“As an increasing number of major retailers, media brands and agencies turn to uTest and our community of 40,000 testers, it’s critical that we fit seamlessly into their in-house QA processes and tools,” said uTest CEO, Doron Reuveni. “Our customers rely on uTest to increase their testing coverage, reduce QA overhead and get new versions of their web and mobile apps to market. This latest version of our platform was specifically designed with those goals in mind.”

About Bug Fix Verification
One of the most compelling new features is Bug Fix Verification.  Since uTest’s community tests apps under real-world conditions– working on real devices, carriers, browsers, and operating systems– it can be difficult for customers to validate that a bug fix has addressed the problem. Now, with the single click of a button, companies can activate Bug Fix Verification for any defects discovered, which automatically sends a request to uTest’s community to attempt to reproduce the functional bugs on a new version of the application, and report back whether the defects have been successfully eliminated.

About Test Case Support
Depending on the number of apps a company has in development at any given time, it may have hundreds or even thousands of test cases to manage. This makes tracking and consolidating the results of test case execution a highly time-consuming task. With uTest’s new Test Case Support feature, customers can see a real-time summary of their testing coverage and quickly identify where problems exist.

For instance, users can instantaneously view a top-line report of a single test case performed across different environments—such as platform, device, browser or country—and  see which steps of which test cases have passed or failed.  Moreover, since companies have the ability to run the exact same test case simultaneously with multiple testers, uTest customers can isolate at exactly which step the problem occurred.  By giving customers the means to access more granular information without adding overhead, Test Case Support provides a tighter level of control to launch apps faster and with greater confidence.

Grid Tools, the leading test data generation, data masking and test data management software vendor, recently announced their attendance at the STAREAST software testing event in Orlando, Florida in May.

With over 100 learning sessions made available to delegates, STAREAST is the largest software testing event in the USA, focusing on software testing analysis and review, software quality assurance, software testing certification, agile testing, software requirements and software project management.

Grid Tools, which has its headquarters in Oxford in the UK, has recently invested in further resource in the USA. The event will coincide with the launch of their new USA team, who will be in attendance. Further investment in the Americas market will follow for the company, who intend to push best practice test data management solutions and “data centric” approaches for testing and development. The event will be one of many for Grid Tools USA this year.

Grid Tools’ General Manager, Richard Groves, commented: “Grid Tools has recently made the first of a number of significant investments in its operations in North America. This coincides perfectly with Grid Tools’ presence at the STAREAST event, giving our customers and partners based in the Americas the opportunity to meet the team and learn first-hand of the benefits and value that Grid Tools’ software and expertise offers in the realm of test data creation and management.”

STAREAST is the most successful software testing event in the Americas, attracting more than 800 delegates yearly. Huw Price, Grid Tools’ Managing Director, was also selected to speak at the 2009 conference. For more information about STAREAST visit: www.sqe.com/stareast/

Blackberry maker Research in Motion added to its growing list of acquisitions on Friday with the purchase of mobile development startup TinyHippos, the company announced in a recent blog post. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Ontario-based TinyHippos is the creator of a multi-platform mobile environment emulator known as Ripple. This tool enables developers to “look under the hood” of mobile applications to evaluate their performance in a number of environments, according to TechCrunch. Ripple is also designed to provide testing and debugging services for HTML5 mobile apps.

Tyler Lessard (News – Alert), vice president of Global Alliances and Developer Relations at RIM, said that the company has been “integrating support for Web technologies like HTML5 and BlackBerry WebWorks into our developer platform, and working to continually deliver enhanced tools and frameworks to our developer community.”

“We look forward to working with the team at tinyHippos to further provide a simplified and streamlined experience to our developers,” he added.

For RIM, the acquisition comes just weeks before it plans on launching its first tablet computer, the Playbook. RIM’s new offering will differ slightly from its line of business-focused mobile products. The Playbook will offer support for the Android (News – Alert) Market, enabling users to have access to as many as 200,000 applications and games.

The Canada-based company announced last week that it’s highly anticipated tablet will hit Best Buy stores on April 19. The tablet will eventually be available for purchase at more than 20,000 retail outlets in the U.S. and Canada, including at AT&T, Verizon, RadioShack, Sears Canada and Walmart, according to the AP.

As expected, the Playbook’s pricing will be in line with the dominant leader in the tablet game, the Apple iPad 2. The 16-gigabyte WiFi (News – Alert)-enabled Playbook will cost $499, while the 32- and 66-gig models will retail at $599 and $699, respectively.

Research by Testuff Ltd. (http://www.testuff.com), a provider of on-demand services for managing and executing manual and automation software tests, and for reporting defects, Shows That 27% of Test Management Tool Users Rely on Email as a Bug Tracker. Paid Solutions FogBugz (Fog Creek) and Jira (Atlassian), Next on the List With 20% and 16%

Testuff has today released a series of bug tracker tools usage statistics, based on information found on the company’s large database.

In the data research the company holds, some interesting, and perhaps even surprising, numbers were found. One notable statistic is no doubt the percentage of users who are still working with their Email application as a bug tracking solution. Unlike the common belief, it seems that many users in the testing industry choose to work with a test management system, even before they have a bug tracker.

The industry’s belief that – in a company’s tools selection process – the bug tracker is selected prior to the test management tool, is therefore untrue for over 1/4 of users.

According to Testuff Ltd’s findings, the two other top solutions on the list are the paid solutions FogBugz and Jira, with 20% and 16% of users opting for these respectively. Only then do the open source solutions (and other paid solutions) appear, with the highest reaching only about 1/3 of these numbers. This is quite surprising, as many of the open source solutions have a high profile online presence, and it was thought that they capture a larger audience than the data now shows.

One possible explanation for this, is the fact that for many, these open-source solutions are not free, as they are serviced as hosted solutions.

Another conclusion to be drawn from the data is that SaaS solutions are favoured by bug tracker users more than before, following the global SaaS trend.

Practicalecommerce.com have featured an article on a new mobile browser testing tool.

Mobile commerce is here and with it comes a steady stream of new mobile browsers. There are device-specific browsers like the BlackBerry browser, Android’s browser and Palm’s WebOS browser. There are also popular desktop browsers that are also available for mobile devices like Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera and Safari.

Like their desktop big brothers, not all mobile browsers are created equal, nor do they function the same. A merchant’s website may look and function differently on each one, which can lead to lost revenue.

To read the full article read Mobile Compatibility: How to Test a Website for Mobile Browsers

Blueberry Software Ltd has released a major upgrade to its innovative screen-recorder-based software testing tool for developers and testers – BB TestAssistant Version 3.0.

Designed to make accurate reporting of complex defects easy, BB TestAssistant is an innovative screen-recorder-based software testing tool that puts vital information at the fingertips of developers.

Key features in the new version include:

• Log Import – automatically import log files during test and display them alongside the movie, allowing a developer to see what was happening on the desktop and in the application.
• Integration Support – automatically upload bug reports to issue-tracking systems.
• Real Time Operation – embeds local time into the recording, allowing a user to jump to any time during playback.
• Notes Support – make quick notes during recording that appear in playback.
• Projects – define projects with common configuration settings.
• Thumbnail Navigation / Activity Monitor – browse thumbnails taken from the movie of specific events, such as application activation, mouse clicks etc.
• TA API – BB TestAssistant provides a COM and EXE API for users to automatically start / stop recordings.
• Remove Inactive Periods – identify and remove periods of inactivity within a movie.
• Auto-Pause – option to only record periods of time while the mouse or keyboard is being used.
• Hide Other Processes – security / data protection feature which restricts BB TestAssistant to record only a specific set of processes.
• Add Watermark – to show copyright or movie source.
• Export to Word – mark important points in a movie, add notes, then produce a Word doc containing screenshots of all these points – perfect for making test scripts.
• Export Notes / Markers to XML / Text – allowing testers to automate connections between notes and movie data.
• Simple API for Upload and Publishing – making it easy for developers to integrate BB TestAssistant 3.0 with bug-tracking systems.
• Minimise Movie File Size – setup BB TestAssistant to make recordings at speeds as low as 1 frame per second.

David Francis, Project Manager for BB TestAssistant, said: “Software testing involves using a newly developed system or application under controlled conditions in an attempt to make things go wrong – in other words to see if things happen when they shouldn’t or don’t happen when they should.

“We’ve worked hard to create an application that simplifies the process of reporting defects, and offers outstanding value with high-end features at a low price.

“BB TestAssistant is easy to use and flexible enough to be incorporated into existing test protocols. Testers need no special training or skills to use it.

“We’ve listened to feedback, and version 3.0 has an array of must-have and sought-after features that we are confident will appeal to professional developers and testers.”

Software testing usually involves software testers working to agreed-upon standards and following set procedures in order to satisfy rigorous quality assurance protocols, as a bug found after releasing the software can be both expensive to rectify, damaging to the reputation of the developer and raise security implications for the customer.

David said: “Software testing should always be a vital part of the software development process and its value should never be under-estimated. However, organisations can vary considerably in how they assign responsibility for QA and testing. We are seeing a continuing trend for companies of all sizes to outsource testing, and this can increase the likelihood of communications problems – exactly the kind of problem BB TestAssistant has been designed to combat.

“Blueberry’s BB TestAssistant has been designed to make it easy for QA staff, wherever they may be, to show defects instead of trying to describe them. A user simply clicks ‘Record’, step through a wizard, and the test is being recorded. When a bug is found, the user can save the recording or add a note. There’s also the option to automatically create a default with the recording attached, on JIRA and TRAC bug tracking systems.”

Reviewing the recording is easy for the developer, thanks to a user interface that lets them get straight to the points of interest. If log files or the Windows event log are imported, they can be seen side-by-side with the movie.

BB TestAssistant is free to download as a 30-day trial.

For more information on BB TestAssistant Pro Edition or BB TestAssistant Expert Edition, please visit http://www.bbtestassistant.com

Developing effective ways to test and evaluate integrated circuits at the nanometer (nm) and atomic scales has become a major challenge with the increasing complexity and decreasing size of microcircuitry. Researchers at HRL Laboratories, LLC, have been awarded a contract from the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) to develop a tool to do just that as part of the Circuit Analysis Tools, or CAT Program.

The goal of the CAT Program is to develop an innovative tool that can identify die-level visual and nonvisual defects in transistors. Such a tool will require increased resolution and be able to analyze areas as large as 10 microns to find such defects.

“HRL’s solution is a tool that will provide functional testing of circuits in development through a unique sensor architecture,” said Dr. Hooman Kazemi, Manager of HRL’s Microwave Technology Department. “The tool is also unique in that it is scalable in resolution and performance.”

In the first phase of the 48-month program, HRL will develop and demonstrate a sensor that will have an order of magnitude higher resolution than the state of the art and will be able to capture very large scan areas.
HRL Laboratories, LLC, Malibu, California (www.hrl.com) is a corporate research-and-development laboratory owned by The Boeing Company and General Motors specializing in research into sensors and materials, information and systems sciences, applied electromagnetics, and microelectronics. HRL provides custom research and development and performs additional R&D contract services for its LLC member companies, the U.S. government, and other commercial companies.

Developing effective ways to test and evaluate integrated circuits at the nanometer (nm) and atomic scales has become a major challenge with the increasing complexity and decreasing size of microcircuitry. Researchers at HRL Laboratories, LLC, have been awarded a contract from the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) to develop a tool to do just that as part of the Circuit Analysis Tools, or CAT Program.

The goal of the CAT Program is to develop an innovative tool that can identify die-level visual and nonvisual defects in transistors. Such a tool will require increased resolution and be able to analyze areas as large as 10 microns to find such defects.

“HRL’s solution is a tool that will provide functional testing of circuits in development through a unique sensor architecture,” said Dr. Hooman Kazemi, Manager of HRL’s Microwave Technology Department. “The tool is also unique in that it is scalable in resolution and performance.”

In the first phase of the 48-month program, HRL will develop and demonstrate a sensor that will have an order of magnitude higher resolution than the state of the art and will be able to capture very large scan areas.
HRL Laboratories, LLC, Malibu, California (www.hrl.com) is a corporate research-and-development laboratory owned by The Boeing Company and General Motors specializing in research into sensors and materials, information and systems sciences, applied electromagnetics, and microelectronics. HRL provides custom research and development and performs additional R&D contract services for its LLC member companies, the U.S. government, and other commercial companies.

iRise^®, the global leader in enterprise visualization solutions today unveiled the iRise Developer Network (iDN), an online community designed to promote and encourage iRise customers, partners and independent developers to extend the iRise visualization platform by leveraging the recently announced iRise iBloc™ and iConnect™ APIs.

The iRise iBloc API enables the quick creation of iRise iBlocs (custom widgets, events and actions from thousands of pre-built components freely available on the Internet), making the assembly of complex visualizations at least ten times faster and easier.

The iRise iConnect API supports integrations and extensions to the iRise platform. With it, developers can create custom reporting tools, integrations to testing tools, extensions to the iRise platform and other new products that use and/or modify iRise data.

National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has released the latest version of its free testing tool, complete with a new tutorial on how to use it.

The tool is a fairly specialised combinatorial testing rig called Advanced Combinatorial Testing System (ACTS). It can process tests for 2-way through 6-way interactions.

However, based on studies of crashes, it is an empirical finding that most failures (70 to 95%) are triggered by only two-variables interacting and close to 100% are triggered by no more than six. Thus the NIST concludes that combinatorial testing with 6-way interactions is as good in practice as exhaustive testing. The program also claims to implement testing efficiently by grouping tests into covering sets.

It is important to realise that the software provided only computes the test schedules – you have to actually implement the tests. For example, if you have a code library which works on n mobile phones each using m browsers with p language engines the program will tell you which combinations need testing – you then have to create the configurations and perform the test. This means that the ACTS program can be used in a wide variety of testing situations and be built into your own larger testing framework.

The new tutorial, Practical Combinatorial Testing, introduces key concepts and methods along with explaining the use of software tools for generating combinatorial tests.  The tutorial is designed to be accessible to undergraduate students in computer science or engineering it is available from http://csrc.nist.gov/groups/SNS/acts/documents/SP800-142-101006.pdf