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Details of Grant 

EPSRC Reference: EP/C005805/1
Title: Ethnography and software testing
Principal Investigator: Rouncefield, Dr MF
Other Investigators:
Sommerville, Professor I
Researcher Co-Investigators:
Project Partners:
Department: Computing & Communications
Organisation: Lancaster University
Scheme: Standard Research (Pre-FEC)
Starts: 01 April 2005 Ends: 31 March 2008 Value (£): 233,417
EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:
Human-Computer Interactions
EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:
Information Technologies
Related Grants:
Panel History:  
Summary on Grant Application Form
This research extends the use of ethnographic studies into new areas of software engineering by investigating how customer-focused software test scenarios can be derived from workplace studies. The rationale for the work is the need to focus the software testing process so that features that are critical to the customer's business are supported and that limited testing resources are used in the most effective way.We argue that an ethnographic approach to deriving test scenarios offers advantages of objectivity and coverage over a user-based approach. The work will involve ethnographic studies in hospitals and with users of a software product, designing templates for test scenarios and investigating how test scenarios and test cases can be derived from the results of workplace ethnography. Building on our work in patterns of interaction, we will extend the notion of vignettes to encompass testing scenarios and will investigate ways of presenting and reusing these scenarios to software testers. The work will be evaluated by comparison with user stories developed through extreme programming and by case studies in a software company and a hospital.
Key Findings
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Organisation Website: http://www.lancs.ac.uk