Review: The Way of the Web Tester

January 7, 2017

Thank you Lance for the thoughtful review.

This is a book review of The Way of the Web Tester by Jonathan Rasmusson. Hat tip: Alister Scott.

A beginner’s guide to automated testing, though not specific to the web, despite the title. Covering the quintessential pyramid of UI, integration, and unit tests as well as basic building blocks of HTML, CSS, HTTP and REST APIs, and JavaScript. The book also spends time on best practices for general software programming and testing.

The goal for test automation, according to the author, is to have more time to do the fun things like developing new features, and less time on boring things like fixing bugs. We can’t test everything, yet “with the right 20%, we can sure test a lot.” Agreed. In broad strokes, this book debunks many common misconceptions of automated testing.