Published by the Southern California Quality Assurance Association, San Fernando, a QAI federated Chapter. SCQAA-SF chapter sponsors the sharing of information to promote and encourage the improvement in information technology quality practices and principles through networking, training and professional development.. SCQAA enables members to share quality practices, principles, concepts, ideas, and methods through meetings, seminars, workshops, reinforces IT quality concepts and practices through networking and membership, and sponsors IT quality concepts and practices throughout Southern California. Join us and help lead the way to better quality software. Visit our web site: WWW.SCQAA.US. NOTE: "Quality In Blue" e-mails are never sent unsolicited. SCQAA-SF only sends e-mails to registered members. If you would like to unsubscribe follow the subscription information instructions at the end of this newsletter. Fee: $10 nonmembers; Free for members. Membership: $65/year standard (one year of meetings); $100/year (one year of meetings + training discount) Questions? Contact scqaasf_newsletter@sbcglobal.net

The Future of Software Testing

Robert Bauer

Wednesday, June 1, 2005 at Countrywide, 2900 Madera, Simi Valley, CA 93065

Networking Dinner @ 5:45; Bootcamp @ 6:15; Business @ 6:45; Program @ 7:00 PM

In the formal methods community, software verification means to prove that a given software system is correct with respect to its specification. Engineers and managers in software Quality Assurance (QA) and Quality Engineering (QE) have a different problem: Increasingly complex software that needs to be "tested" in ever decreasing amounts of time. Even if you prove that some software system is correct (with respect to its specification), you still need to test the software system. This does not mean that the techniques of formal methods are "orthogonal" with those used by QA/QE teams. It means that QA/QE teams will be more effective if they understand the ideas and limitations of formal methods. QA/QE teams can incorporate many of the concepts and even the techniques themselves within the test environment.

While many practices of formal methods are quite mathematical and complicated, the techniques themselves are quite simple. This talk gives a high-level overview of these techniques and shows how they apply at a very practical level to the problems faced by QA/QE teams.

Robert T. Bauer has over 20 years of industry experience. Robert has worked in research labs and in real-world business application development. At NCR he developed a wide-variety of software to support large-scale testing of the Teradata database. His Parallel Test Environment (PTE) is now the standard testing environment at NCR and is being used at the 5 Teradata development centers. Robert is well known in the software quality community for his contributions to software testing. He developed a testing strategy called Customer-Based Testing. This strategy combines software reliability engineering, automatic test case generation, and usage coverage to minimize the risk of expensive failures and to maximize assurance of base functionality.

Robert also has 20 years of teaching experience and has been an adjunct and associate professor at Chapman College, National University, Portland State University and the Oregon Graduate Institute. He has taught a variety of graduate and undergraduate classes. He has been designated as a Master Training Specialist by formal board action of the Chief of Naval Training. (This designation is earned by less than 0.5% of all military instructors). Robert is a well-known lecturer who has given many talks on a wide variety of quality assurance and testing topics.

Robert has undergraduate degrees in E.E. and I.T (Magna Cum Laude) from SIU as well as a Master’s in Theoretical Computer Science from Loyola. Robert is completing his Ph.D. in Computer Science at Portland State University in the area of Formal Semantics.

“Quality Culture,” Pre-Meeting Bootcamp! This informative half hour training session, presented by Karina Gamble, with Bill Hackenberg of Countrywide, is an added bonus based on real life experience. Come a half hour early at 6:15 to learn and enjoy!

Software Testing for Test Managers

Thursday June 2, 2005; 8:30 a.m. – 5: 30 p.m.

Making sure you have adequate testing planned for your projects can be very challenging if you are a Project Manager who is under a lot of pressure to meet deadlines with limited resources. Companies tend to cut back on QA teams, add more responsibilities to the overworked Project Manager and hold Project Managers more accountable for the outcomes. For the first time, we are offering a software testing course designed specifically for Project Managers. This course provides a working knowledge of the key elements required for Project Managers to plan, measure, and monitor progress of their project specific test program tasks. It provides a review of the various types of software testing, giving the Project Managers an in-depth understanding of how to evaluate the effectiveness and appropriateness of various types and levels of testing that need to be performed for each phase of the software development cycle.

What will you learn?

Ø Support the creation of testable requirements and design.

Ø Determine specific test strategies based on the quality dimensions and risks

Ø Develop comprehensive test plans and advocate successful test solutions.

Ø Determine quality risks and define actions to take to mitigate the risks.

Ø Evaluate the effectiveness of efficiency of test efforts.

Ø Plan and implement test improvement initiatives.

Ø Develop services level agreements and specific quality metrics programs.

Ø Evaluate product and process quality metrics.

Who should attend?

Project managers, especially those who need to play a more active role in testing and quality assurance to fill the resource gaps in their projects.

Instructor

Robert T. Bauer has over 15 years of experience working in research labs and in application development. He also has 20 years of teaching experience and has been adjunct and associate professor at Chapman College, National University, Portland State University and the Oregon Graduate Institute. He has taught a variety of graduate and undergraduate classes. He has been designated as a Master Training Specialist by formal board action of the Chief of Naval Training. (This designation is earned by less than 0.5% of all military instructors). Robert is a well-known lecturer who has given many talks on a wide variety of quality assurance and testing topics.

Location

Both courses are being held at the University of Phoenix, 5955 De Soto Ave, Woodland Hills, CA 91367

Course Fee

QAInsight is offering these highly anticipated software testing courses for ONLY $199 each! For more information, email training@qainsight.com Register Online now! www.qainsight.com/cgi-bin/class.cgi

$199 (10% discount to PMI, AITP and SCQAA members. SCQAA SF full members receive a 30% discount). Members will receive their membership discounts on the day of the class. Proof of membership is required.

SCQAA-SF Meetings – Door Prizes

Just by attending our great meetings, you are eligible to win the raffle for some really GREAT door prizes. During our meetings in 2004 & 2005, we gave away a variety of great door gifts, including a Visioneer 7100 USB flatbed 48 bit color scanner with powerful document software, a Canon LiDE 30 USB flatbed 48 bit color scanner with powerful document software and various other software packages and books. We are also able to provide entrance tickets to professional conventions and other events from time to time. Be sure to attend so you can have an opportunity to win one of these useful and interesting door prizes!

Whether you come for our enlightening speaker, come for the announcements, come for the food, or come for a chance at the door prize, come to our next meeting and learn even more about software quality assurance!

MARK YOUR CALENDAR! Wednesday, July 6, 2005 Monthly Meeting in Countrywide, Simi Valley, CA Speaker: TBD, Topic: TBD Wednesday, August 3, 2005 Monthly Meeting in Countrywide, Simi Valley, CA Speaker: TBD, Topic: TBD

Quality Meetings Upcoming

June 1 Accessible Computing for the Blind featuring Paul Schmidt, Center for the Blind & Visually Impaired and Bert Borja, Foundation for the Junior Blind. Presented At the Regular Meeting of the Los Angeles Chapter of ACM held at Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles. http://www.la-acm.org/meetings.html

June 4 8 AM – Noon (half day seminar) How to Choose the Best Approach to Your Project Portfolio Projects - Frank Reynolds. Sponsored by PMI Los Padres Chapter. Location: Pepper Tree in Santa Barbara. http://pmi-lospadres.org/index.phtml

June 9, 2005 6 – 9 PM Monthly Chapter Meeting of the PMI – Los Angeles Chapter. Luis Zells. At the Proud Bird Restaurant, 11022 Aviation Boulevard, Los Angeles. http://www.pmi-la.org/

June 14, 2005 6 PM Harding Web Application Code, presented by Mike Villegas, CISA, CISSP, Manager-Technology Risk Management, Wells Fargo. Sponsored by ISACA-LA at their Annual General Meeting at the Monterey Hills Steakhouse Free to ISACA-LA members. Contact: http://isacala.org/

June 21, 2005 6 – 9 PM Monthly Chapter Meeting of SCQAA-Orange County. At Volt in Orange, CA. http://www.scqaa.com/meetings.htm

June 21, 2005 6 – 9 PM “Open Mic Night” at the Monthly Chapter Meeting of STC – San Fernando Chapter. At Radisson Hotel in Chatsworth. http://www.stcsfv.org/meetings.htm

June 23, 2005 6 – 9 PM Internet Law Briefing for Project Managers, by San Fernando Valley Bar Association. Sponsored by PMI Los Padres Chapter. Location: Palm Garden Hotel, Thousand Oaks. http://pmi-lospadres.org/index.phtml

June 24 8 AM – 5 PM. ePrescribing by HIMSS Long Beach Meeting at the Long Beach Holiday Inn. http://www.himss-socal.org/calendar/calendar.html

August 25, 2005 6 – 9 PM. Predicting Project Disasters - Paul Glen. Sponsored by PMI Los Padres Chapter. Location: Palm Garden Hotel, Thousand Oaks. http://pmi-lospadres.org/index.phtml

September 22, 2005 6 - 9 PM. IT Strategy/Business Alignment/Get Control by Giving up Control - Susan Cramm, Columnist for CIO magazine. Sponsored by PMI Los Padres Chapter. Location: Palm Garden Hotel, Thousand Oaks. http://pmi-lospadres.org/index.phtml

October 27, 2005 6 – 9 PM Principle-centered leadership - Gregory D. Totten, Ventura County District Attorney. Sponsored by PMI Los Padres Chapter. Location: Palm Garden Hotel, Thousand Oaks. http://pmi-lospadres.org/index.phtml

Job Opportunities

Senior Software Quality Assurance Engineer to join Quality Assurance team of company in Santa Monica. This position reports to the Director of Web Quality Assurance. This position requires analyzing requirement and design specifications, and analyzing web business applications. You will be responsible for developing and executing test plans, test matrices and test cases. In addition, you will be performing integration, regression and system testing. The Senior Software Quality Assurance Engineer is responsible for submitting problem logs utilizing the online problem tracking system, and being the Lead on complex software testing projects. You will be responsible for preparing the QA project plans, maintaining schedules, and creating and documenting SQA procedures. Other key duties include reporting software issues and concerns to the Director o! f Web Quality Assurance, and working independently and within engineering practices to evaluate, maintain, modify and enhance existing quality methods and processes. Requirements for this position include a Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Computer Science or a related field, 8+ years experience in a SQA, a strong knowledge of SDLC/SQALC, Internet/Web experience, knowledge of Win/UNIX/Browsers, experience with automation (Mercury, Segue, Rational) and project/schedule management (MS Project 2000, 2002). Advanced expertise in Oracle/SQL back-end testing, and expert knowledge in test plans, test cases, and test matrices are also a must. In addition, the successful candidate must have excellent communication and writing skills, strong organizational skills and the ability to multi-task. Contact: Steve Heckler, Steve Heckler Associates (310) 440-0353 or (310) 709-0383 (cell) www.stevehecklerassoc.com

Our Corporate Meeting Sponsors

Serena, Corp. at 20920B Warner Center Lane, Woodland Hills, is our very first chapter Corporate Meeting Sponsor. We very much appreciate their sponsorship, which provides the SCQAA San Fernando Board with a fine workspace for our Board meetings.

Countrywide, Corp. in Simi Valley is our second chapter Corporate Meeting Sponsor, as they are providing Membership meeting space, starting with the first monthly meeting on September 17, 2003.

QAI Certification Programs

To request more information, send email to certify@qaiusa.com.

Earn CPEs

Are you a CQA or CSTE? Earn some of your Continuing Professional Education (CPE) points by attending SCQAA-SF meetings. Earn even more by helping with our committees!

Southern California Quality Assurance Association San Fernando Chapter (SCQAA-SF)

QAI Certification Programs

To request more information, send email to certify@qaiusa.com.

Meet Your SCQAA

San Fernando Chapter Board

The current Board slate is composed of:

Position	Board Member	Backup Member
Chapter Chair	Judy Cheves	Shahidul Manan
Vice Chair	Shahidul Manan
Treasurer	Deanna Witrack	Judy Cheves
Secretary	John Heeg	TBD
Chapter Advisor	Jim Stoumpos
Distribution Chair	Gerry Caruso	Karina Gamble
Employment Opportunity Chair	Arturo Torres
Events/Promotion	TBD
Food Service Chair	Peter Reidy
Librarian\Historian	Lenni Lara
Meeting Chair	Kidra Shadroo
Membership Chair	Ron Winters
Newsletter Chair	Elizabeth Runyon	Deanna Witrack
PMI Liaison	Bill Hackenberg
Program/Education Chair	Karina Gamble
Sponsor/PR Chair	Bob Tabaka	Bill Hackenberg
Web Team	Shahidul Mannan Kidra Shadroo Leonard Daly
Webmaster	TBD

Would you like to be a speaker and have a topic of interest to the quality community? Contact the Program Chair (karina@qainsight.com) or Chapter Chairperson (Judy.cheves@Countrywide.com) and let us know what you would like to contribute.

Would you like to contribute information to this Newsletter? Contact the Newsletter editor at this address: scqaasf_newsletter@sbcglobal.net.

The SCQAA San Fernando Board holds monthly Board Meetings at Serena Inc. in Woodland Hills. If you would like to attend the Board meeting and would like to help this chapter, please contact Judy Cheeves at E-Mail (Judy.cheves@Countrywide.com ) to obtain the meeting schedule and location.

Subscription Information

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We'd love to hear from you. Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Please help us respond to your requests and input by writing to one of the Board members. See our contact list at http://scqaa.us/contact.php

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Directions to Our Meeting Location in Simi Valley:

You might want to check out driving directions from your starting point on yahoo.com, but here is how you will finish the trip:

Countrywide Financial 2900 Madera Road, Simi Valley, CA 93065 1C Central Lobby Presentation & Video Make your way to CA-118 and go to Simi Valley Exit CA-118 on Madera Road North Go 0.3 miles then turn right on North Madera Road Go 0.3 miles past Countrywide Way to first driveway on the right: 2900 North Madera Road. Follow the driveway up and around the building on your right and park on the other side (which is actually the front). Conference room 1C is right off the main lobby.