Testers are involved in release planning and especially add value in the following activities:
- Defining testable user stories, including acceptance criteria
- Participating in project and quality risk analyses
- Estimating testing effort associated with the user stories
- Defining the necessary test levels
- Planning the testing for the release
Testers are involved in iteration planning and especially add value in the following activities:
- Participating in the detailed risk analysis of user stories
- Determining the testability of the user stories
- Creating acceptance tests for the user stories
- Breaking down user stories into tasks (particularly testing tasks)
- Estimating testing effort for all testing tasks
- Identifying functional and non-functional aspects of the system to be tested
- Supporting and participating in test automation at multiple levels of testing
Release and iteration planning should address test planning as well as planning for development activities. Particular test-related issues to address include:
- The scope of testing, the extent of testing for those areas in scope, the test goals, and the reasons for these decisions.
- The team members who will carry out the test activities.
- The test environment and test data needed, when they are needed, and whether any additions or changes to the test environment and/or data will occur prior to or during the project.
- The timing, sequencing, dependencies, and prerequisites for the functional and non-functional test activities (e.g., how frequently to run regression tests, which features depend on other features or test data, etc.), including how the test activities relate to and depend on development activities.
- The project and quality risks to be addressed
