The Beta Test

You have finished coding up your application. What is the next step? Maybe you can start selling the thing and begin making some cash. That is a very premature move. You would hate life if the thing you shipped is chock full of bugs. All software has bugs. But you want the one you ship to be free of the easy to detect and fix type of bugs. You need to run a beta test of your software.

The best beta test will be one conducted by actual users of your software. That might be difficult if this is your initial release. Instead you need to have some people you trust to test out the code. This might be a contract with a service that does testing. Maybe you could scrounge up some developers to do the job. I would like to call on some friends (who themselves might be developers) to bang on the app. Only then will I know what things I have overlooked during my unit tests.

I do have a wild and crazy idea that might not be feasible. I could write some software that itself would do the beta testing. It could randomly simulate clicks and key presses. Or it could be tailored to click away like a nommal user would. Then it could compare the app results with what it expects is the correct behavior. The output that has the most bang for the buck would be that which does not conform to expected behavior. I will let you know how my beta testing comes along. Stay tuned.