Questions worth finding answers for, before you start to test.

I have drafted below the list of questions that are worth to ask before you start your testing tasks.
Answers to few questions can be got from the stakeholders & few by yourself. These are not focused on security or performance or any form of testing, they are generic to any project.

I hope to get few more from you once you skim through them.

Phase-1:

• What is the objective of the project?
• What is the scope of the project?
• What are the risks involved in the project?
• What is the objective & scope of testing this project?
• Who are the real users of the product that is under test?
• Which quality criteria must be the testing activity focused on?
• Will I get a demo or overview of the project?

Phase-2:

• Will I get access to the code?
• Is there any kind of documentation available, if not who are the stakeholders of the project?
• Will I get the contact details of them?
• What is the configuration of test environment?
• What is the configuration of production environment?
• Which features are more riskier than others?
• How often can I get the builds?
• Have I spoken to the audience of my test reports for what is expected?
• What is the expected frequency of status reports by the stakeholders?
• What are the deliverables expected from me?

As a tester learn to learn before you learn to teach.

This blog post is about how you could learn about a product or rather a project before you are confident of making a fresh mind understand the aspects of what you will be working or have worked upon.

Once you are into any project, its either your project lead/ team lead does the honor of making you understand what the product/project is about. Yes, I understand the frustration few would have gone through while getting trained in a class room based training for days together & sometimes months together. It would be quick run of a slideshow or a senior most person blabbering about only achievements that they have made in the project. And hence trying to put on the onus on the young minds as if a war is about be fought with situation being - "Crititcal critical critical....." until the project halts. I myself have undergone such situations in organisations that I had worked earlier, that those words (critical...) being used atleast thrice daily throughout the year.

• Below is the extract of what I & Yagnesh have prepared after being inspired by Dhanasekar on using the mindmap tool.
• The view of this can ascertain the level of understanding one has before starting the project.
• This mindmap covers most of the aspects that one has to learn about the project before anyone steps into it.
• This can be used even as a training material for any fresh mind coming into the project. 
• This shall also tell us about the aspects that are missed which can be covered to test the product better.
• This could well be expanded into more minute details based on contexts.