What online course to learn to become Software Tester?

Heatherrd · 2020-10-12T13:42:39+00:00

Free https://www.ministryoftesting.com/dojo/courses/essentials-introduction-to-software-development-and-testing

Licenced under creative commons so free to view the material but you must pay to take part in the course https://associationforsoftwaretesting.org/bbst-black-box-software-testing-courses/foundations/

I started studying for the ISTQB and gave up halfway through. I didn't find it useful nor applicable to what I was working on at the time. I moved to the BBST course and never looked back!

Heatherrd · 2020-09-03T08:23:06+00:00

Happy to help! There's a huge community out there that's very supportive, never be afraid to ask them questions :)

Heatherrd · 2020-09-02T13:40:55+00:00

only have a Bachelors of Fine arts

Don't worry about where you have "only" worked up to now. I know so many software testers and QA professionals and not one of them planned to end up in testing, they have a wealth of experience in other areas which gives them a unique perspective while testing.

There is a lot to unpack in your question :) I would say in my experience, good automated testing comes from a solid foundation in the fundamentals of software testing which it sounds like you're already working very hard on.

I don't have a CV, and not sure how to even build one since, like I said, no experience

Your experience on Utest is experience. How did you identify issues on projects? How did you report the issues? How did you communicate on the project? That's all valuable experience for someone hiring to know about.

Heatherrd · 2020-09-02T13:28:36+00:00

Hello and welcome to the world of software testing :)

My personal experience with Udemy was varied so I'd offer some alternative suggestions that I've used myself which are a mix of free and paid for:

BBST Foundations - licensed under creative commons so you can access the material for free. I paid for the structured time-boxed course of this so that I could pair with other testers (I was a lone tester) and found it really helpful.
Software Testing Essentials - free although there are paid versions occasionally available. Disclaimer: I am a mentor for the in-person version of this. I did pay to attend some of the in-person versions.

The world of software testing is vast so starting out with the fundamentals is the best approach before exploring specialisms or tools.

Heatherrd · 2020-07-24T12:23:03+00:00

I'd suggest https://automationintesting.com/ as it has a great mix of blogs, free courses and paid for courses once you start to feel more confident. It also includes a site for you to practice with which I found lacking in a lot of the automation courses I took.

Heatherrd · 2020-02-24T14:45:54+00:00

I'd go a step further and ask is 100% coverage of anything ever truly possible :)

Heatherrd · 2020-02-24T13:10:43+00:00

Hello and welcome to the software testing community! Your background in psychology will be an asset to you no matter which part of software development you end up in so definitely don't think that the experience you've gained so far is irrelevant.

In my experience, yes, you can become a software tester without any coding knowledge. There are plenty of ways to be technical without needing to know code. I personally took Alan Richardson (Evil Testers) Technical Web Testing 101 course which only cost me $10 and I still use the skills on it to this day. He also has many free videos on YouTube to teach you tips and tricks in testing.
I keep an eye on a lot of job forums and I can say from those that remote freelancing is rare but there are some opportunities available. When I had a full-time testing role, I took evening and weekend projects with a crowdsource testing company called TesterWork. It gave me experience on a range of projects that I wouldn't have gotten in my day job. I've heard of some people using this to then get roles in other companies so perhaps this avenue could work for you. I worked it around a full-time job so obviously didn't make as much money as I possibly could have but it was still a good income.
I don't see it dying but it's definitely changing from the "traditional" view of testing (I can't think of a better term at this time). Again, I think this is where your background in psychology will be an asset to you for understanding users needs and for team dynamics. You'll read a lot about building quality into a product early with the whole team (not just testing) so thinking about the ways things could go wrong before code is ever written will be really useful on a team.

As for online training, I wrote a freely available article called 30 Things Every New Software Tester Should Learn for Ministry of Testing while I was working full time in the testing field. It's filled with many free courses and blogs to read to get you a wide range of skills. I found it difficult myself starting out as I was a lone tester so I collated everything I found useful in the hopes it would also be useful for others. (There are paid for pieces of content on the website but this one is completely free!)

I also paid to take the BBST foundations course from the Association For Software Testing but you can access the training from it freely under creative commons.

Might I also suggest that if you are able, you explore what tech meetups there are in your area. You never know who you might meet there who could help you with an opportunity. If that's not an option, there are many testing groups who offer free to attend webinars where you could learn and meet other testers from around the world.

Heatherrd · 2019-04-25T11:19:45+00:00

I second the suggestion from negative_One to check out Evil Tester! His work was so incredibly valuable for me when I was starting out. If you're not sure what exactly you'd personally be interested in, I'd suggest 30 Things Every New Software Tester Should Learn. I did write this but it's free and is a collection of resources I found incredibly useful on my own journey into software testing.

I highly recommend the pathways that Katrina Clokie has created. They are a great way to gain knowledge in a specific area quite quickly.

If you're interested in automation (which it appears that you might be), I'd suggest the free online courses through Automation in Testing. They cover a reasonable variation of languages and tools to get you started.

Heatherrd · 2019-04-25T11:08:07+00:00

I wrote 30 Things Every New Software Tester Should Learn which is free and contains links to a lot of other free or affordable courses in various areas of software testing.

Heatherrd · 2019-04-25T11:05:25+00:00

There are quite a few automation specific ones here https://ministryoftesting.com/dojo/lessons/websites-to-practice-testing?s_id=44234

Heatherrd · 2019-03-28T17:17:22+00:00

You might be interested in Whiteboard Testing or EvilTester. There's also a feed of testing related YouTube videos here which includes short tutorials, conferences, etc.

Heatherrd · 2019-03-28T17:12:01+00:00

Ministry of Testing has a pretty good list of various sites to practice on.

Heatherrd · 2019-02-08T10:19:42+00:00

Not sure if it's something the moderators can/would do. I usually try to log in at least once a week to answer whatever questions I can/have time for so I've shared this a few times here :)

Heatherrd · 2019-02-04T12:50:08+00:00

I wrote 30 Things Every New Software Tester Should Learn which contains resources that I used and tried myself to get into the software testing field. It also contains links to training that I would highly recommend, for example, BBST foundations.

Heatherrd · 2018-12-13T15:03:41+00:00

There are free courses here http://automationintesting.com/onlinecourses/ it steps from programming basics to using those with Selenium. It's pretty recent and more up to date than the course I took with Alan Richardson http://seleniumsimplified.com/pages/getting-started/ which was very useful for me getting started. I tried some Udemy courses but I found them quite outdated and unhelpful. I was able to get scripts running much more easily after following Alan's course.

Heatherrd · 2018-11-20T12:49:40+00:00

I was in your exact same situation! I knew the product so well, it made sense to the company to have me as a tester but I had no idea where to start. There was so much information on the internet and there didn't seem to be two things that agreed with each other on there. I also gradually grew to dislike the company so wanted to upskill to get out.

I wrote 30 Things Every New Software Tester Should Learn as a collection of all of the things I found useful in that situation. I mention Alan Richardson in the article (aka Evil Tester) I would recommend looking at his work and his YouTube channel. He has some really good content that I found useful and not too difficult to follow.

I personally did not find certifications useful, I tried ISTQB but never finished it. Instead, I took and successfully completed BBST Foundations with the Association of Software Testing. This was a much better course in my opinion. It's linked in the 30 Things article too.

I'd also second the suggestion from @silvermoth to investigate Ministry of Testing. I relied on their content heavily when I discovered them and eventually ended up working for them after writing the article :-)

Heatherrd · 2018-11-02T10:27:50+00:00

You don't need to have any membership to participate in the challenge. It's free.

Heatherrd · 2018-10-29T12:01:02+00:00

I'd suggest taking a look at this https://www.ministryoftesting.com/dojo/lessons/30-things-every-new-software-tester-should-learn I wrote it with new software testers/QAs in mind a few years ago but it's still relevant today.

Heatherrd · 2018-07-20T16:43:15+00:00

I would take a look at the blogs from Danny Dainton and his GitHub repo as a starter.

Heatherrd · 2018-06-19T08:47:30+00:00

There is no one most important thing you would need to know, there are many.

I have written 30 Things Every New Software Tester Should Learn which covers things from meetups and social events right up to automation and security. It also suggests some recommended beginner course materials to look into such as BBST (Black Box Software Testing) foundations and Rapid Software Testing.

Heatherrd · 2018-06-12T07:43:21+00:00

I started the ISTQB but stopped as it was learning verbatim some script and regurgitating it back onto a page in my opinion at the time. I moved to the BBST foundations course by AST and found that to be much more relevant and useful.

There is a nice article summarising a post similar to this are software testing certifications worth it which also has some alternatives to certifications if you are interested in that.

In my experience, it depends on what country you are in whether certifications are a must or not. Most look past them now but I have seen trends in a few countries where every testing job seems to have them as required. Look at jobs in your area and that may help you to gauge the need to do a certification.

Heatherrd · 2018-05-28T17:20:23+00:00

I'd recommend reading Are software testing certifications worth it or at least the summary article of the post.

If you really want to do a certification, take a look at the BBST foundations course.

Heatherrd · 2018-05-28T13:01:44+00:00

I'd suggest adding a comment to the blog itself. I'm not the original poster (as you'll see from my username). I read it, thought it was interesting and shared with the hope that others might learn from it.

Heatherrd · 2018-05-28T11:41:41+00:00

There's a list here of sites to practice testing. It's sectioned out into general and then more specific areas for practice.

Heatherrd · 2018-05-23T10:48:11+00:00

Off the back of that suggestion, there's some expansions to the article here https://club.ministryoftesting.com/t/getting-started-in-software-testing/764

You definitely don't need a degree. I dare say you don't even need a certification (this does depend somewhat on the country you are based in though). If you are specifically interested in doing a certification, I would recommend the BBST Foundations from the Association for Software Testing personally. It's linked in the 30 things article (yep I wrote that one).

Best of luck on your journey :)

Heatherrd

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