| The IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is a publicly available | | | | Plan and design test |
| collection of books owned by the UK Governments' | | | | Verify test plan and test design |
| Office of Government Commerce (OGC). | | | | Prepare test environment |
| After the first publication of ITIL, the amount of books | | | | Perform tests |
| quickly grew to about 30 volumes. The second set of | | | | Evaluate exit criteria and report |
| ITIL publications (v2) was published with a specific goal | | | | Test clean up and closure |
| of ensuring ITIL was more accessible to those | | | | It should be noted that when implementing these |
| interested in it, and to consolidate the information into | | | | activities for ITIL software testing they will not be |
| sets that grouped these guidelines in to differing | | | | undertaken in sequence. In fact, several activities |
| aspects of applications, IT Management and services. | | | | should be done in parallel. |
| However, the cost of these ITIL manuals is still | | | | While ITIL does mention many different approaches to |
| significant, particularly for non-commercial use. | | | | testing, one of the main objectives of Service Testing |
| ITIL version 3 outlines a broad set of testing guidelines | | | | and Validation is to provide quality assurance and |
| and best practices. It does not restrict the project to | | | | establish that the project will deliver a product that is fit |
| following one testing methodology, but rather | | | | for purpose and use. Risk Based test approaches |
| encourages the selection of principles that best fit the | | | | support these objectives and, in particular, reinforce the |
| requirements. It does emphasize the need to reduce | | | | Project Wide Risk Policy established during the |
| risk early in the project lifecycle and provides several | | | | Strategy phase. |
| suggestions as to how to do this. Test processes are | | | | By determining and populating the appropriate Risk |
| outlined within the Service Transition portion of the ITIL | | | | Matrix for an organisation or project, the Risk Policy |
| lifecycle covering the management of change, risk and | | | | can be better enforced through the Testing Process. |
| quality assurance. | | | | Using a Risk Based approach, ITIL can provide a |
| Prior to Service Transition, project management is | | | | systematic method to: evaluate requirements; improve |
| encouraged to develop policies that apply to the | | | | test effectiveness and efficiency; report progress; and |
| project as a whole. These include: Service Quality; | | | | gain consensus on high risk requirements, can only |
| Risk, Service Transition, Release and Change | | | | further support these overall objectives. |
| Management policy. | | | | As a final pointer, ITIL is considered the world's most |
| One of the primary goals of Service Transition is to | | | | advanced set of IT practices. These practices cover |
| 'minimize the risks from transitioning the new or | | | | many functions and activities, including software testing |
| changed services into production', by applying a | | | | best practice.The enormity of ITIL can be daunting and |
| uniform set of policies to the project as a whole and | | | | it can be tempting to view it as too big or requiring too |
| have them applied throughout the project lifecycle, the | | | | much bureaucracy to implement successfully. Certainly |
| various teams are better able to enforce and follow | | | | there are many initiatives to implement ITIL practices |
| through on set quality standards. By ensuring early | | | | that have failed and there are many that have |
| understanding and buy in from Senior Management | | | | introduced excessively bureaucratic processes. But |
| and/or Clients regarding processes and policies it | | | | there are many more organisations that have |
| allows the project teams to focus on core deliverables | | | | benefited from implementing improved practices from |
| rather than re-educating or re-negotiating policies | | | | ITIL that have helped alleviate problems that had |
| repeatedly throughout the lifecycle with the risk of | | | | previously plagued them. If an ounce of prevention is |
| altering expectations midway. While the Service | | | | really worth a pound of cure, then ITIL could be a |
| Transition documentation does not restrict the project | | | | metaphorical answer to tackling obesity in our IT |
| in the test methodology used, it does state the | | | | practices at a time when we are all conscious of the |
| following test activities should take place: | | | | need to get into a healthier shape. |
| Validation and test management | | | | |