OVERVIEW

Quality assurance (QA) testing is the process of locating, isolating, and describing software defects, commonly known as bugs, so they can be fixed by programmers or the data preparation staff. QA testing usually starts sometime during the latter part of the development process. QA testing is usually going full speed when the site is posted and close to going live. In a sense, testing is never really finished because it is performed as long as the site is live and being updated and maintained; however, testing activity generally tapers off once the site goes live and is in use.

In some websites, QA testing directly impacts the quality of the site. It is the final quality-control gate through which the site must pass before it is finished. The more users are expected and the more complex the website, the more important is the QA testing process. The testing phase is crucial because of the variety of user hardware configurations, including different versions of various browsers on different hardware platforms (e.g., PC, Mac, UNIX, Linux) and a variety of possible screen resolution settings (from 640 480 and 800 600 and higher). You should test your website for all of the different configurations your users might have.

Design flaws, suggestions for redesign, and proposed design changes are duly noted, but ideally user interface design decisions have already been made. QA testing focuses on identifying program malfunctions and, to a lesser extent, content errors, so they can be...