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Indian Testing Board

ISTQB Certified Tester


program
About ISTQB
„ Officially founded as a non-profit organization in
2002
„ It is the parent body responsible for approving
various national boards.
„ Responsible for the "ISTQB Certified Tester”, an
international certification
„ Currently there are 18 national boards approved
by ISTQB and others are in the process of
formation
„ For details please visit http://www.istqb.org
ISTQB Certified Tester
„ An internationally recognized tester
certification examination
„ Multi-level examination
• Foundation Level
• Advanced Level
• Expert Level
„ Over 20,000 holders of ISTQB compliant
certificate
„ De facto standard in Europe and making
rapid progress in Asia and America
How to tell a good apple from a bad
apple
„ Questions that are worth asking when
looking at a certification
• Who are the people behind this certification?
• What are the processes behind creation of this
certification?
• What does this certification evaluate?
„ If the answers to these questions are not
satisfactory then the apple is bad.
ISTQB Certification: People
„ International working groups, composed
of test practitioners, consultants, and
trainers that represent each National
Board, create the syllabi or bodies of
knowledge for the different levels.
„ Prominent personalities of testing world,
authors of books on testing, consultants
and trainers such as Rex Black, Randy
Rice, Dorothy Graham, Erik Van
Veenendaal and many more…
„ Prominent practitioners from the Industry
spread across eighteen nations
ISTQB Certification: Knowledge
„ The typical member of working group has
ten years of experience and is a published
expert on the topic of testing.
„ With five or ten people on each working
group, each syllabus represents the
distillation of 50-100 years of experience
in the field of testing.
„ The syllabi are reviewed and approved by
all the National Boards, with collectively
probably close to a millennium of test
experience amongst us all.
ISTQB Certification: Process
„ Non-profit nature of ISTQB
• Nobody pushes own agenda
• No vested interests
„ Neutral, fair and open nature of the certification
• Various national boards provide input to the syllabus,
examination questions and other processes. Removes
biases
• Not tied to any particular school of thought or
methodology
„ Any training provider can apply for accreditation
„ Dynamic certification: Syllabus, exam pattern
revised periodically
ISTQB Certification: What it tests
„ Multiple level exam
• Foundation level:
„ Tests knowledge
„ Entry level certification
• Advanced level
„ Tests skills
„ for people with
• two or more years testing experience and
• some specialization in the field, like automation, reviews, or
management;
• Expert level:
„ Tests skills
„ Expert level is for people with more than five or even more
years of experience.
„ we put in those syllabi only those techniques and
concepts that have real-world application.
Advantage ISTQB
„ It is
• Practical
• Supports a career path
• Represents the distilled wisdom of many
experts in the field
• About promoting the broad profession of
software testing rather than the narrow
financial interests of particular training
companies and consultancies
Foundation Level Exam
„ Knowledge based exam
„ Requirements
• No experience required
„ Certificate valid for whole life
„ Syllabus is crisply defined
„ Demonstrate
• a commitment to testing as a profession
• an awareness of general terminology and concepts
• the ability to apply some basic techniques like
equivalence partitioning, boundary values, and code
coverage analysis
Exam pattern
„ Exam Format
• Closed book 90 minutes exam
• 35 multiple choice questions.
• Approximately 70 marks
• Minimum 60% marks for passing
Advanced Level Exam…
„ Tests skills (as opposed to
knowledge)
„ Practice oriented
„ Much more challenging than
foundation level
„ Requirements
• Foundation level certificate holder
• At least 24 months of testing experience
Advanced Level Exam
„ Consists of three exams
• Technical Tester
• Functional Tester
• Test Manager
„ You can take any combination
„ If you clear all three, you get an
additional certificate for the complete
“Advanced Level”
Works done by ISTQB
„ Creation of a Glossary of testing
terms which will be adopted by
British Computer Society as their
standard
„ The glossary has been submitted to
ISO and IEEE too
„ The new Foundation level syllabus,
due to be released soon, will help
define testing in a much better way

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