There is a lot of attention given to automated software testing using tools such as QTP and Function Tester. But not much attention is paid to test data management. Let's talk about you and I and how pair-wise testing will dramatically improve the quality and productivity of your automated software testing efforts.

Software automated software testing raises a few questions:

1) Who is testing the tests themselves?
2) Where does the test data come from?
3) How can the test data be tuned by the requirements?
4) How can you create requirements – test traceability matrix?
5) How can the approach be integrated with automated testing tools?

Understanding principles like:
• Exhaustive testing
• t-wise testing
• Orthogonal arrays
• All-pairs testing
• Automated traceability

These and other principles will be discussed in conjunction with automated software testing to help you understand the challenges of automated testing and an approach that will accelerate the your automated testing process.

William E. Lewis is a 43 year veteran in the computer industry who holds a B.S. in Mathematics and M.S. in Operations Research. He has also taught at the university level for five years and is the author of the best-selling book "Software Testing and Continuous Improvement" (3rd Edition published in 2008). He has also published a problem solving book series called "Problem Solving for Programmers”. In his spare time he is a certified Software Quality Engineering (SQE) instructor.

Bill is a founder and president of Smartware Technologies, Inc., a quality assurance consulting firm that specializes in software testing. He is a certified Quality Analyst (CQA) and certified Software Test Engineer (CSTE) sponsored by the Quality Assurance Institute (QAI) of Orlando, Florida. Over the years, he has presented several papers to conferences such as QAI’s Annual International Information Technology Quality, Software Quality Engineering, and the American Society for Quality and the Association of Information Technology Practitioners.

Bill retired from IBM after 28 years. His positions included 12 years as a Senior Instructor, course developer and instructor, and numerous years as a System Programmer, Systems Performance Analyst and Mathematical modeler. Bill retired as an Assistant Director with Ernst & Young, LLP, located in Las Colinas, Texas and served as the Quality Assurance Director and worked in the consulting group. He managed several software testing projects and also directed the ISO initiative, which resulted in ISO9000 international certification for Ernst & Young.

Has been also the Director of Quality Assurance at CitiGroup where he setup and managed the test automation efforts, developed the quality assurance processes and procedures and participated in the CitiGroup CMM effort.