Manual testing 15 - What is ad-hoc testing? What is buddy testing, pair testing and monkey testing?

Ad-Hoc Testing.
Forms of Ad-Hoc Testing.
Why we have to do Ad-Hoc Testing
When to do Ad-Hoc Testing
Who will do Ad-Hoc Testing

Ad-hoc Testing:-

Testing the application randomly is called Ad-hoc testing.

Or

Testing application without following any rules and regulations , No documentation, No test designs, No test cases is called as Ad-hoc testing.
Here rules and regulations refer to process followed during normal or regular testing.
Fox ex during regular testing we follow CRS, SRS, Test plan , Test cases and many more documents to complete our testing.


But during Ad-hoc testing we don’t follow any documents (CRS, SRS, Test plan, Test cases) and we simply access application randomly and test it. (Like a monkey typing while dancing).

Forms of Adhoc Testing :
1. Buddy Testing: Two buddies, one from development team and one from test team mutually work on identifying defects in the same module. Buddy testing helps the testers develop better test cases while development team can also make design changes early. This kind of testing happens usually after completing the unit testing.
2. Pair Testing: Two testers are assigned the same modules and they share ideas and work on the same systems to find defects. One tester executes the tests while another tester records the notes on their findings.
3. Monkey Testing: Testing is performed randomly without any test cases in order to break the system.
NOTE:-
• Ad-hoc testing is basically negative testing because we are testing against requirements (out of requirements).
• Here, the objective is to somehow break the product.

Why we have to do Ad-Hoc testing?
• This is mainly done with the aim of trying to uncover defects or flaws which cannot be captured through traditional or formal processes followed during the testing cycle.
• End-users use the application randomly and he may see a defect, but professional testers use the application systematically so he may not find the same defect. In order to avoid this scenario, testers should go and then test the application randomly (i.e., behave like and end-user and test).
When to do Ad-Hoc testing ?
• Whenever we are free, we do Ad-hoc testing. i.e, developers develop the application and give it to testing team. Testing team is given 15 days for doing FT. In that he spends 12 days doing FT and another 3 days he does Ad-hoc testing. We must always do Ad-hoc testing in the last because we always 1st concentrate on customer satisfaction
• After testing as per requirements, then we start with ad-hoc testing
• When a good scenario comes, we can stop FT, IT, ST and try that scenario for Ad-hoc testing. But we should not spend more time doing Ad-hoc testing and immediately resume with formal testing.
• If there are more such scenarios, then we record it and do it at the last when we have time.

Who is responsible to Ad-Hoc testing?
Testers who have good knowledge of the business and clear understanding of the requirements- Detailed knowledge of the end to end business process will help find defects easily. Experienced testers find more defects as they are better at error guessing.

Possible interview questions on ad-hoc testing
What is Ad-Hoc Testing.
Which are the Forms of Ad-Hoc Testing.
Why we have to do Ad-Hoc Testing
When to do Ad-Hoc Testing
Who will do Ad-Hoc Testing