Weblog for the AMIS Technology corner
Posts tagged software
Automated SOAP testing with maven and the SoapUI plugin
Mar 26th
Currently there are few tools that can support testing SOAP interfaces. Both Jmeter and SoapUI are suited for testing soap interfaces. SoapUI is explicitly created for testing SOAP interfaces and Jmeter has a SOAP support since version 2.3.x. I have worked with both tools and I prefer SoapUI. It has an intuitive user interface and is flexible. (Please also have a look at the blog of Jeroen)
You can run SoapUI stand alone but I prefer to integrate these kinds of tools with an automated process. Below you will find instructions for running SoapUI as a part of a maven build. This makes it possible to run your automated SOAP tests in Maven with a build process like Hudson. Combined with automatic deployment it is possible to support an agile software development process that supports frequent delivery of versions and continuous testing.
Maven supports SoapUI with the Maven SoapUI plugin. Read the rest of this entry »
Agile software development, the principles. Principle 3: Deliver working software frequently
Dec 2nd
This is the third of 12 posts about the principles of agile software development. Purpose is to go back to the start of the agile manifesto (http://agilemanifesto.org/principles.html) and discuss the implementation of the 12 principles in real life software engineering. Goals of agility are to go deliver software of higher quality, faster, with a higher acceptance to end-users and able to follow the changing business requirements to strive for competitive advantage.
The question is: is this going to work in practice or is this only based on a nice marketing and sales story.
Principle 3: Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale.
Old school linear development methods rely upon the assumption that an extensive specifications and design phase upfront will resolve all uncertainties and specify of all possible functionality in depth. After the design phase the development team retreat to their software factory to deliver the desired software in one big bang (in many cases many months or even more than a year later).
The result of this linear approach is a system; of witch the customer thought a year ago, he would need it in a year. As if the team could stop time to await the delivery of this system. Changes in environment and renewed insights are not incorporated in the end-product.
Agile software development, the principles. Principle 1: Deliver valuable software
Jun 8th
This is the first of 12 posts about the principles of agile software development.
Purpose of this, and the upcoming 11 posts, is to go back to the start of the agile manifesto (http://agilemanifesto.org/principles.html) and discuss the implementation of the 12 principles in real life software engineering.
Goals of agility are to go deliver software of higher quality, faster, with a higher acceptance to end-users and able to follow the changing business requirements to strive for competitive advantage.
The question is: is this going to work in practice or is this only based on a nice marketing and sales story?.
Principle 1: Satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.
The discussion here is of course "what is valuable software?".
Opinions differ between stakeholders of the project. From a developer perspective valuable software is nice designed with all OO principles of encapsulation, inheritance and abstraction. From the end-user perspective valuable software is a rich, customizable user interface and loads and loads of features that make the daily work easier. The support department sees valuable software as easy to install, configure, manage and cost effective in maintenance. The business owner just wants an effective TCO value in relation to the business value. To get an answer to this question you have to get back to the business case of the project. The business case sets the GOALS of the project against to the costs of creating the deliverables to reach the goal. The Software is just one (in many cases the most important) of the deliverables of the project and the customer uses the deliverable to reach the goal.
