terminology:
error: "Human mistake in thinking"
defect: "Bug in code (caused by error)"
failure: "System behaves incorrectly (caused by defect)"
chain: "Error → Defect → Failure"
oracle_problem:
definition: "How do we know the expected result is correct?"
approaches:
- specification_oracle: "Compare against spec"
- reference_oracle: "Compare against reference impl"
- consistency_oracle: "Same input → same output"
- heuristic_oracle: "Reasonable approximation"
static_testing:
definition: "Examine without executing"
techniques: [reviews, walkthroughs, inspections, static_analysis]
finds: "Defects before runtime"
examples: [ESLint, SonarQube, code_review]
dynamic_testing:
definition: "Execute and observe behavior"
techniques: [unit, integration, system, acceptance]
finds: "Failures during execution"
black_box:
equivalence_partitioning:
principle: "Divide inputs into equivalent classes"
example: "Age: [<0 invalid], [0-17 minor], [18-64 adult], [65+ senior]"
boundary_value:
principle: "Test at boundaries of partitions"
example: "Age: test -1, 0, 17, 18, 64, 65"
decision_table:
principle: "Combinations of conditions → actions"
use: "Complex business rules"
state_transition:
principle: "Valid sequences of states"
use: "Workflow, state machines"
white_box:
statement_coverage: "Every statement executed once"
branch_coverage: "Every decision branch taken"
condition_coverage: "Every condition T/F"
path_coverage: "Every possible path (often impractical)"
risk_assessment:
likelihood: "How likely to fail?"
impact: "How bad if fails?"
priority: "likelihood × impact"
risk_matrix:
high_high: "Test extensively, first priority"
high_low: "Good coverage"
low_high: "Good coverage"
low_low: "Basic coverage"
defect_lifecycle:
states: [new, assigned, in_progress, fixed, verified, closed]
reopen_trigger: "Verification fails"
severity_vs_priority:
severity: "Technical impact (critical/major/minor/trivial)"
priority: "Business urgency (high/medium/low)"
example: "Typo on login page: low severity, high priority (brand)"
isolation_levels:
unit: "In-memory, mocked deps"
integration: "Containerized DB (Docker)"
staging: "Production-like, isolated"
production: "Real, feature flags for testing"
test_data_strategies:
fixtures: "Static predefined data"
factories: "Dynamic generation (faker)"
snapshots: "Sanitized production copy"
synthetic: "Algorithm-generated edge cases"
