Let’s Go Larvae Hunting!

Talk Description

Sometimes a tester's most valuable work doesn't result in a formal bug report. It can often be more valuable to identify issues before they get a chance to become bugs. Jen calls these issues “larvae”: issues that aren’t bugs yet, but which have the potential to grow into bugs if left unchecked. This makes “larvae hunting” the practice of identifying potential bugs in software before the change is implemented.

When you identify issues as larvae, you can fix them early and with less work, meaning you need fewer expensive bug fixes later in the development process. Good larvae hunting is a mix of testing the requirements, spec and design, along with good observation of people and their interactions, as well as the ability to imagine bugs. 

In this Masterclass, Jen talks about what larvae hunting looks like and how you can encourage testers to spend more time hunting larvae. Jen will walk you through how to find bugs before they become bugs and what skills you need to develop. Jen also highlights how to create the right environment for larvae hunting where teams have the right people and information and where everyone feels safe to raise concerns.

This Masterclass was kindly sponsored by Xray, the leading Quality Assurance and Test Management app for Jira. More than 4.5 million testers, developers and QA managers trust Xray to manage 100+ million test cases each month. It is a mission-critical tool at over 5,000 companies in 65 countries, including 137 of the Global 500. With Xray you can plan, execute and track your testing with full requirements traceability supported by both manual and automated tests, including BDD using Cucumber as well as JUnit, NUnit, Robot and others. Discover the future of testing and start your free trial today at getxray.app.

By the end of this session, you'll be able to:

Jen Kitson

Software Engineer & Test Lead

Hi! I’m a software engineer and test lead, currently working with telecoms software. At work, I’m interested in helping people develop testing skills, thinking about how we communicate about quality, and approaches to test strategy. Outside of work I love dancing, folk music and reading fantasy novels. Recommendations for music and books will always be gratefully received!