For many years, the major software development companies have only focused on just the development of software rather than caring enough for its ?verification? and ?validation?. But with time and with the losses that companies have experienced because of faulty software, software testing has appeared as an extremely important part of the software development cycle. Successful testing is a critical concern for most of the software majors. While some leave it to their in-house human resources to take care of, some pay extra to hire trained staff, specifically skilled to take care of core software testing manually.

But before we go on to discuss about the keys to successful software testing, it is necessary to understand its importance. Software testing does not necessarily deal only with the inefficiencies of the software application or bugs within it. It rather safeguards the software from being labeled as defective ? which may create a negative ripple on the market regarding the product as well as the parent company itself. When a company develops a product, the acceptance of the product among its target audience is a vital factor regulating its critical and commercial success. Therefore, preparing an assessment report is always a pre-requisite for a company before investing in a particular software product. This can, therefore, be considered as one of the primary points for successful software testing.

The second key to successful software testing reveals two important aspects - termed ?verification? and ?validation?. It is the primary duty of software testers to point out whether the developed software has been designed keeping in mind the technical requirements (?verification?) and whether it fulfils the client requirements (?validation?) as well.

Individual companies have their own software testing guidelines. But in general, most of them adhere to an accepted list of points that have been listed below:

Software testing has to be planned much before the actual testing begins, possibly right from the inception of the software itself. Also to ensure the best results, an independent and unbiased third party should be handed the assignment of software testing.

A detailed test plan is chalked out with consistent strategies. The ?Testbed? is also created at this stage.

The testers are to start with specific areas, i.e. with a ?small? scope, and widen their scope (generalize) as they progress.

Defects and errors tend to be detected based on a common factor ? staff inexperience or complexity of the software for instance. Targeting these areas will solve majority of the problem.

A set of tests are not to be run repetitively, since repetitive tests do not produce better results. Instead their error-detection capacity decreases with monotony. Alternate software testing methods should also be tried in parallel to the conventional tests to ensure better effect.

Successful software testing detects problems early, and saves fixing costs as well. This is because once the software is available to the users, fixing errors and implementing damage control can cost fortunes to the company.

Rechecking of defects by a fresh team of software testers, or after a considerable period of time.

?Regression tests? and proper documentation are also a vital part of successful software testing, as without these, debugging the software application would be impossible.

The last key to successful software testing is closing the test and saving all the output results, solutions, methods, and analysis reports for future reference.

And finally, no software can be completely tested and branded as 100% defect free. It is the acumen of the project managers to group and design test scenarios from the infinite set of test cases and do this with a risk based approach.

Successful software testing is all about providing quality products to consumers and eliminating possible bugs at each level. Always remember that a successful software testing program helps detecting yet-to-be-discovered errors, thereby, saving both grace and money for the parent company.