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Training Finally Making the Grade
25th January 2005
When Vipul Kocher, president of the Indian Testing Board (ITB) started his career in software testing after completing his masters in
Computer Technology, most people told him he was on the wrong bus. But, open the recruitment pages of any
newspaper today and the message comes in loud and clear-"Software testing engineers are finally making the grade".
Software testing has assumed tremendous importance in both software solution and services domain, and also as an independent market segment.
Says Sridhar Kulasekharan, Chief Operating Officer, ReadyTestGo, "Testing accounts for 30% of the software development market.
The global testing market is estimated to be a $13 bn industry. With the boom of third party software testing business, the need for
quality and trained manpower has become a critical issue in the industry."
A Gartner report estimates that IT organizations will outsource 85% of application testing and there will continue to be a shortage of
professional testers through 2005.
Training
A booming software testing industry has spurred the growth of the education industry with a number of companies cashing in on the
need for qualified testing professionals.
Since software testing is fundamental to delivering quality software on time and within budget, software testing professionals have
great career growth opportunities.
There are many international institutes like QAI and IIST, which provide training & certification in software testing (see table, The
Educators....)
Unfortunately, none of the universities in India has seen this as an opportunity to develop a course in software testing. Usually, it is
the local institute that takes up this opportunity and develops a curriculum based on their work experience.
While Gireendra Kasmalkar, managing director and CEO of Verisoft InfoServices is surprised that educational institutes of the likes
of NIIT and Aptech have not capitalized on this market segment, Anand Deshpande, managing director, Persistent Systems thinks
there is a perception problem involved here. "Testing as a career is not seen as sexy enough. Therefore there is lack of availability of
the right skill sets. People need to realize that testing goes hand in hand with product development and we cannot separate the
developer and the tester."
Vandana Dandekar and Meena Sane, joint CEO's of Quexst Associates claim to be among the first in the country to have realized
the need to offer courses in software testing. In the past two years, Quexst has trained 600 students. A batch of 24 students gets
trained from their facility in Pune every month.
Vyom SQTL Labs has tied up with the Computer Society of India (CSI) to bring Software Testing Qualifications Board (ISTQB)
accredited courses in software testing in the country. The Indian Testing Board is responsible for the "ISTQB-Certified-Tester"
Certification in India. Founded in February 2004, the board has been recognized as the national board of India by ISTQB in April
2004.
Officially founded as a non-profit organization in 2002, ISTQB is the parent body responsible for approving various national boards
and also for the "ISTQB Certified Tester", an international certification. Currently there are 17 national boards approved by ISTQB and
others are in the process of formation.
"We are the first in the country to have brought ISTQB certification to India," says Uday Birasdar, director, Vyom STQL Labs. So far
they have trained over 3000 professionals-over 300 students are trained every month.
Seed Infotech, on the other hand, is offering courses in software testing for the past three years, offering the US-based QAI
certification. Narendra Barhate, director, claims to be receiving at least 300 enquiries every month. Seed has trained over 1500
professionals for software quality and testing including CSQA and CSTE certification. Seed has also tied up with Softest Lab, the
value added sales partner of Mercury in India. Mercury has come up with a Certified training partner program in India for all its
educational services. Beginning this December, Seed will offer four courses - Mercury Quick Test Professional, Mercury Load
Runner and WinRunner.
Ipeople, on the other hand, has not tied up with any international agency for offering certified courses. Managing director Rahul Jain
says his company is performing pretty well. It is setting up training centers in Mumbai and Chandigarh next month and already has
one center in Pune and one in Delhi.
Educational institutes of the likes of SCIT have begun offering a module on software testing as part of their curriculum.
Issues on Certification
Currently there are three international certification standards that govern the software-testing segment-QAI of USA, ISTQB of
Germany and ISEB from UK.
However, a single international syllabus and certification for software testing professionals is being developed by the International
ISTQB, working with the BCS Information Systems Examinations Board (ISEB), a German certification and accreditation body,
ASQF and other national boards.
Is it the new opportunity?
Yes, to an extent. Even as the software testing industry is amidst a boom, training software testing professionals is unlikely to
become a mass-market industry. For the simple reason that testing is a niche market and requires specific domain skills. Unlike
other training, testing training requires real world testing experience in order to make the training meaningful. "I see a lot of individuals
as well as training companies gobbling up material from some books and presenting it as training. This means there is a need in the
market that is not being met by good players. Moreover, a lack of consensus on the standards and a commonly agreed upon body of
knowledge in the testing world, does not help either. ISO/IEEE/BS standards are available but are not widely used since not
everybody agrees with these. Efforts are, however, on by SPIN (Software Process Improvement Network) in Mumbai to take up this
issue. The Software Process Improvement Network is comprised of individuals who want to improve software-engineering practice.
Nanda Kasabe With Inputs from Sunitha Natti in Hyderabad and Priya Padmanabhan in Bangalore.
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