What is the informal and formal software testing review?

Review

A review is a type of testing where a group of people discuss the product produced by the developer, detect errors, and try to correct them in a systematic manner.

Reviews play a key role in the software testing process.

Types of reviews

There are two types of reviews:

• Informal reviews
• Formal reviews

Informal reviews

Informal reviews take place between two or three people. The review conference is scheduled at their convenience.

• This meeting is generally scheduled during the free time of the team members.

• There is no planning for the meeting.

• If any errors occur, they are not corrected in the informal reviews.

• There is no guidance from the team.

• This review is less effective compared to the formal review.

Formal reviews

Formal reviews take place among a team of three to five members. In the formal review, the members discuss the software model.

• This meeting is scheduled beforehand. This gives the team members time to prepare.

• This meeting consists of a professional team that identifies and corrects errors in the model.

• This meeting does not exceed two hours.

Review meeting

At the end of the meeting, there is an acceptance stage. It involves the following three rules:

• If the project meets the expectations, they accept the model.

• If the project has a significant amount of errors, they reject the model, ask to modify it, and have another review meeting.

• If the project has only a few errors, the team asks to correct the mistakes, and there are no further review meetings.

In addition, a formal technical review summary report is taken.

This report answers three questions:

• What was reviewed?
• Who reviewed it?
• What were the findings and conclusions?