Naturally, you test and re-test, running through all possible positive, negative, and edge cases. You've become so ingrained with the inner-workings of the project that somewhere along the way, you miss the obvious - the essence of what its about.
Full disclosure, this has happened to me a couple times. You're so bent on looking for the "show-stoppers" bugs, but you'll overlook the obvious.
What I call seeing the forest from the trees.
All the more reason why it helps to have a fresh set of eyes. Someone unfamiliar with the app / site, who doesn't have a test plan, or test scripts to follow, but will use it as it was intended.
The greatest lesson I learned was to step back from the project and look at the entirety of it. Ask yourself, "what is this supposed to do?" (and I don't mean asking from a functional perspective). A lot of times, the most obvious issues will be missed when objectivity is lost.
If this has happened to you, I'd love to hear about it.
All the time...
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, what is worse is doing this while looking at the backend stuff on top of of the front end. I tend to see more front end then the back end, being it feels that back end testing needs a microscope to look at. As if it's the deciphering subtext in a size .5 font.
Either way, I also call this ocurrence "Unintentional blinders". - kind of like when they put blinkers/blinders on carriage horses so that they only see forward and nothing in their peripheral view.
What I think may help is a small checklist to look back at as a reminder to ask yourself, "What if.....?" and apply it to said application/project/campaign.
Overall, I think the best solution is putting multiple eyes on a test, but there are instances where a campaign is so complex that it is difficult to pull in a fresh body without some complications along the way.