STARWEST 2026 - Exploratory Testing
Wednesday, September 23
Purposeful Exploratory Testing: Finding What Matters When Time Is Tight
In today’s fast-paced delivery environments, testers are often expected to ensure quality with limited time, incomplete knowledge, and communication constrained to tickets and acceptance criteria. The result? A heavy focus on repeatable regression and surface-level checks—while deeper, high-risk issues can go unnoticed. This talk introduces Purposeful Testing—a practical, context-driven approach that helps testers focus their efforts where they matter most. Instead of simply verifying requirements, purposeful testers seek to uncover the risks that truly impact users and the business. They...
Making Exploratory Testing Data-Driven with Pareto Analysis
PreviewThis session presents a disciplined approach to exploratory testing that combines component-level defect analysis with focused and data-driven test charter design. Christopher will demonstrate how to decompose an application into meaningful components, consistently map defects to those components, and apply Pareto analysis to identify the areas responsible for the majority of defects. These high-risk components then become the basis for targeted exploratory test charters that summarize relevant defect history and provide testers with concrete test ideas and heuristics. Each...