[Year 12 SofDev] Test data question

[Timmer-Arends]

Hello Frank

Yes, although if one were designing test data from a program specification 
eg 'when x is more than 50, blah blah must happen', rather than from code 
(somewhere I once read a useful distinction here: 'black box' testing v 
'white box' testing), then the three values become important since we don't 
know what the programmer actually coded.

I would agree with the incorrect data type being tested as well, especially 
in languages that don't have any data typing to speak of.

Regards
Robert T-A
Brighton SC

> Frank Van Den Boom wrote:
>> A couple of the VITTA sample papers have had the following type of 
>> question where students are asked to suggest three values that should be 
>> used to test an if statement like the following.
>>  if x > 50 then
>> ....
>> else
>> ....
>> endif
>>  I have no issue with boundary values 49 and 50 being essential. It's the 
>> third one I have a problem with. The solutions say "when testing an 
>> algorithm, always select values that are within the required range, at 
>> the boundary of the required range, and outside of the required range". 
>> So for the above code, the solution suggests using 49, 50, 51.
>>  I don't see that 51 is telling us any more than 50, so I don't really 
>> consider it useful test data and have taught my kids to also include 
>> invalid data types as part of this testing. eg. "apple" I guess it 
>> depends on how/where data input features in the code being tested.
>>  What do others think about this?
>>  Frank
>
>
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