The finance office is testing a payroll program before it is used for temporary staff. A test plan includes normal hourly rates, the lowest permitted rate, ...
Question 1 Report
The finance office is testing a payroll program before it is used for temporary staff. A test plan includes normal hourly rates, the lowest permitted rate, the highest permitted rate, blank entries, text in number fields and values just outside the accepted range. The main program calls a subroutine that calculates weekly pay only after validation. The tester wants to show that both the boundary checks and the error handling work, rather than only showing that a normal example works.
(a) Explain what is meant by boundary testing in this payroll scenario. [2]
(b) When the accepted number of hours is 0 to 60 inclusive, give two boundary test values. [2]
(c) Explain why a test using 61 hours is useful. [2]
(d) When text is entered for an hourly rate, state one expected outcome. [1]
(e) Explain why normal, erroneous and boundary test data should all be used. [1]
Answer Details
(a) Boundary testing means testing values at the limits of the permitted range and values on or close to either side of those limits. It checks whether comparison operators have been implemented correctly. [2]
(b) Two suitable boundary test values are 0 and 60, since these are the inclusive limits. Values -1 and 61 are also valid boundary-adjacent tests. [2]
(c) 61 tests that the upper limit of 60 is enforced. The program should reject it without calculating incorrect pay or crashing. [2]
(d) Reject text entered for an hourly rate and display an error or request a numeric rate. [1]
(e) Normal, erroneous, and boundary data are all needed because different categories reveal different faults in validation and program logic. [1]
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