Choosing your QA direction: automated or manual testing

rabiarahi

At TeachMeSkills, we offer four testing courses to choose from — manual testing of mobile and web applications, as well as automated testing in Java, Python, and JavaScript.

All areas are relevant, in demand, and relatively easy to learn (if you make an effort, of course). The courses take 4-4.5 months on average, and during this time you will have time to gain the amount of knowledge and practical skills necessary to get your first job.

But which area should you choose? Let's figure it out together! A QA engineer is a specialist who ensures the quality of a product (literally, from quality assurance). This is done by testing programs or social media marketing service applications, during which errors are discovered. These errors are then corrected, and the user gets access to a cool and working product without a single bug (in an ideal world). Let's start with the easiest way to master the profession — through manual testing . Manual engineers do not write code, but manually test the product. The advantage for a company in such specialists is speed and cost - it is cheaper and faster if, for example, a client unexpectedly wants to add a new function (and it takes time to redo automated tests). Alena (QA lead/Team manager at iTechArt with 6+ years of experience in manual testing) What key qualities would you highlight for a tester?
diplomatic ability to defend one's opinion or proposals;
communication skills, since you have to communicate a lot with all participants in the development process (including in English);
read books and articles for self-development.

Are testers really some kind of phlegmatic and perfectionist? Or are these stereotypes?

Regardless of temperament, a person can master this profession. Bringing some property to the maximum can play a cruel joke on us, so it is always worth sticking to the golden mean, although, sometimes, it is very difficult. It is great when several psychotypes are represented at once in a team - there is a mutual complementarity. And do not believe stereotypes, but rather check on yourself)




Of course, manual testing will be easier for those who are completely far from programming languages ​​or do not have a technical education at all, but have good communication and analytical skills. However, this does not prevent you from starting to learn a programming language from scratch in parallel or going completely into automation. The main thing is desire and interest in a new field!

If we are talking about black box testing, then knowledge of the code and its proofreading will not be needed at all. That's why it's a black box — we test only from the UI point of view. But if you want to improve your technical level, deepen your understanding of the product, become a kind of universal soldier, then at least a minimal knowledge of the language will definitely not hurt you, but on the contrary — will bring you value in the tester market.

Will require more effort (which will at least pay off — since they pay more) for a beginner. When choosing a programming language for future work, we advise you to look at its demand.

For example, Python . It is easy to learn (especially from scratch) and offers a lot of opportunities both in technical terms (the language has been in all sorts of tops for many years) and in professional terms (by the number of vacancies).

Dmitry (QA Automation Backend Engineer at ITS Partner with 3+ years of commercial development experience)

Does a beginner need to know anything before coming to the course? Or should they read some books to get a feel for the topic?
No. Will it be good if they initially have some knowledge of testing, networks, programming? Definitely yes. As practice shows: the more a person knows when they come to the course, the easier it will be for them. This is logical)

If a person has figured out what types of data there are in Python, what a binary operator, cycles, function are, and solved problems before the course, then, based on practice, people finish the training well. Because they don’t get stuck at the initial stage, but devote more attention and effort to more complex topics.

It’s always good to read books. But I would advise you to watch Python courses on YouTube, where the person explains in great detail (and often even a beginner can understand). Then solve problems on codewares.com. If this is not enough, then you can start reading "Learning Python" (Mark Lutz) and dive further into more complex topics.

Maybe there is some story from personal examples, how a person from a completely different field of activity was able to change it and become a tester?

In principle, this is my case - I graduated from BNTU and decided to change my profession, because I was not satisfied with mine. Since I was not from the IT field, I had to learn a lot myself: what is API, what types of testing there are, the basics of testing. I had to study what databases are, how they work, what HTML is and in general, how some basic things work in terms of automation, how to write simple code. I had to study quite a lot myself and I also had good manual courses (this was also a plus) - that's why I succeeded.

The guys from my courses - many come at 35, and 38, and 18-19, they all succeeded. A lot of examples from management, MSLU. In principle, everyone starts with one thing — and then, based on their strengths, desires, and the time spent, they achieve different results. And in general, what do you think, in terms of difficulty for beginners, Python will occupy? Python itself was created as a language that would be very friendly to people. To those who will write in it. In principle, it is quite simple in this regard. But it is worth saying — you should not expect it to be easy. You can draw an analogy with linguistic languages. Is it difficult to learn Chinese? Yes, very much. I think so, I have not studied it. Is it difficult to learn English? Yes. Easier than Chinese, but you also need to learn it, spend time, study. Therefore, the same is true for programming. Will Python be more intuitive than, say, C++? Yes, it is. But does this mean that Python can now be learned easily? No.