Risk
Based
Testing

The Risk-Based E-Business Testing Official Companion Website

Paul Gerrard and Neil Thompson, Artech House, ISBN: 1580533140; 1st edition (August 2002)
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The Authors

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Paul Gerrard

Paul is the Principal of Gerrard Consulting.

He received his M.A. in engineering science from Oxford University and MSc and DIC in structural engineering from Imperial College, London University. Having worked briefly as a consulting civil engineer, he moved into software engineering in 1981. For ten years, he worked as a developer, designer, project manager and consultant working initially on engineering applications and later, in the telecommunications and IT arenas.

He has worked for Gerrard Consulting and Systeme Evolutif as a test manager, consultant and trainer for a diverse range of clients in the banking, insurance, government, aviation and manufacturing industries in addition to central government, software houses and utilities.

Paul has been Co-Programme Chair for the British Computer Society Specialist Interest Group in Software Testing (BCS SIGIST) which is the primary forum for software testers in the UK and is also a member of the BCS Software Component Test Standard Committee that created the British Standards BS7925-1 (Glossary of Software Testing Terms) and BS7925-2 (Software Component Testing). He was the founding Chair and is currently member of the BCS Information Systems Examination Board (ISEB) Testing Certificate Board whose aim is to establish a certification scheme for testing professionals and training organisations.

He is a regular keynote speaker at seminars and conferences in Europe and the US and been a keynote speaker at EuroSTAR, STAR in the US, Mercury Interactive User Group, CMG TestFrame conference, the Norwegian and Swedish and Danish specialist interest groups in software testing and won the ‘Best Presentation’ award at EuroSTAR ’95.

Paul has written many papers and articles on software testing, most of which are available on the Gerrard Consulting web site. These include topics such as Client/server, Internet and E-Business testing, risk based testing, test automation, test process improvement, testing requirements, performance testing, business simulation testing and test methodology.

He has created many methodology and training assets. He wrote the system test methodology, SysTeMet™, training courses in Acceptance Testing, Risk Based Testing, E-Business Testing and a  ISEB accredited Foundation Course in Software testing. He created the Test Organisation Maturity Model, TOM™ which includes a database that can generate weighted test process improvement opportunities.

Paul is the webmaster for the Gerrard Consulting web site which has a searchable database of web links to papers and articles on software testing, an online forum for testers and TBT training courses in software testing.

Gerrard Consulting is a software testing consultancy specialising in E-Business testing, RAD, test process improvement and the selection and implementation of CAST Tools. Evolutif are founder members of the DSDM (Dynamic Systems Development Method) consortium, which was set up to develop a non-proprietary Rapid Application Development method. DSDM has been taken up across the industry by many forward-looking organisations.

Paul's email address is paul AT gerrardconsulting DOT com.

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Neil Thompson

Neil Thompson is an independent testing consultant and testing manager, serving blue-chip clients through www.TiSCL.com, either directly or in association with other consultancies. He worked with Systeme Evolutif for one of the projects on which the book is based; this was a follow-on assignment enabled by an earlier shared success with the same bank.

Neil has worked for 25 years in information systems, initially with a hardware manufacturer and two of the UK’s leading software houses, followed by a period abroad with an international user organisation. After a further ten years as a management consultant with global firms, Neil launched his own company in 1998, since when he has fulfilled several successful assignments for high-profile organisations in the financial services, retail, pharmaceutical and information technology sectors. His overall experience also embraces the “network” industries – energy, transport, water and communications – plus other complex and mission-critical applications.

He therefore has a wide perspective on the IS business, including roles as a programmer, systems analyst and project manager. He has shared the frustrations of users and the sleep deprivation of operators, and as a scientist with artistic tendencies he now feels fulfilled as a testing specialist. This sometimes leads to broader-based work around quality assurance, change management and process consulting.

Neil’s testing expertise began with intuitive unit testing using various languages from assembler upwards, then developed with exposure to structured methodologies and leadership of system testing and acceptance testing. He became the leading testing expert with one of the world’s top management consultancies, specialising in systems integration, and is now active amongst the UK’s most prominent testers in sharing experiences and ideas with colleagues in Europe, the USA and beyond. This is based on a long record of speaking at conferences and seminars, and writing magazine articles: for example, Neil spoke at the first two EuroSTAR events (in 1993 and 1994), and his 1999 paper sowed some of the seeds of this book. He is collaborating with Paul Gerrard on a tutorial for the 2002 EuroSTAR conference.

He is a graduate of Cambridge University (UK), and a member of the British Computer Society (plus its specialist interest groups in Software Testing and Configuration Management). He holds the ISEB Foundation Certificate in software testing and has applied to take the Practitioner Certificate examination during 2002. Neil is also a Certified Management Consultant (Institute of Management Consultancy, UK) and a member of the IEEE.

Neil's email address is: neilt AT tiscl DOT  com (email address is not a link to foil spammers).

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