With a number of projects now calling on my testing services, I’ve had to quickly get up to speed. To help in this, I’ve been using the SF DEPOT mnemonic, one of a number of testing mnemonics that a tester can call on.
SF DEPOT stands for:
S -> Structure
What is the product made of? What files, libraries, any documents?
F -> Functions
What is the app meant to do, how does it do it, is it through a GUI or an API or both?
D -> Data
What are the input and outputs? Where do the inputs come from? Are there any defaults? Who looks at the outputs?
P -> Platform
What does it run on? Any specific versions? Any 3rd party controls/libraries?
O -> Operations
Who uses it and what do they do with it? How do different users use it?
T -> Time
Is the first time use different from the second? Any time related constraints – leap years? How about these time test ideas from Michael Bolton?
Using these I can quickly build up a map of the application, start to work out testing ideas and make sure I am getting good coverage with my testing.