ICST 2008 - Call for Papers

***** CALL FOR PAPERS *****

ICST 2008 Workshop - "Creating an International Software Testing Standard"

This one-day workshop will be held in conjunction with the 1st IEEE International Conference on Software Testing, Verification and Validation (ICST 2008), http://www.cs.colostate.edu/icst2008/, Lillehammer, Norway, April 9-11 2008.

This workshop will be a collaborative forum providing an opportunity for the software testing community to become involved in the international standardization process with the dual aims of both producing a better software testing standard and gaining greater consensus on testing process within the testing community.

Background:

In May 2007 ISO formed a working group to develop a new standard on software testing – a new area for ISO. This initiative is closely-supported by IEEE and BSI, both of which are providing existing standards as source documents to the project.

The proposed standard, ISO 29119, comprises four parts. The first covers ‘concepts and terminology’, the second ‘test process’, the third ‘test documentation’, and the fourth ‘test techniques’. Of these four parts, it is the second on ‘test process’ that is the least well-supported by current standards.

Although, at first glance, the definition of generic test processes may appear a relatively simple task, experience in standards writing shows us that generally areas that are considered the most mature and widely-understood are often those where it is most difficult to gain consensus. The purpose of this workshop is to help address the challenge of defining generic test processes that will be of practical value to future users of this standard.

The current vision for coverage of test processes in the new standard is a three-tiered approach corresponding to the creation (and update) of the Test Strategy at the organizational level, a Master Test Plan at the individual project level, and a generic test process beneath that. This generic test process will define the execution of testing at each of the different test levels (e.g. component, integration, system, and acceptance) and for different test types (e.g. functional testing, performance testing and security testing).

It is the intention that the workshop will reflect this three-tiered approach with three sessions, each of which will comprise two parts. There will first be presentations on the theory and practical implementation of the process for the particular tier and these will be followed by interactive discussions on how the process could be implemented in ISO 29119.

Submissions:

Submissions are invited for papers (no longer than 8 pages) on either the theory or practice of:

• Creation of an organization-level Test Strategy; 
• Creation of a Master (Project) Test Plan; 
• A generic test process applicable to the different test levels (e.g. component, integration, system, and acceptance).

Submissions will be reviewed by the Workshop Program Committee and subsequently published in the IEEE digital library. Each accepted speaker will deliver a 20 minute presentation at the workshop.

Submissions can be made via this e-mail link to Stuart Reid: sreid@testing-solutions.com

Important dates: