Test Run

We are pleased to announce the latest version of Test Run, Beta 7, is now available for download and is also available on the online version as well. This release is very significant and requires users of the downloadable version of Test Run to make some fundamental changes to their Test Run database, which is detailed later in this post. These changes however are required in order to meet the demands of Test Run’s growing international user base. Now in use in China and Europe, customers submitted feedback requesting support for the UTF-8 character set so that multibyte characters would be displayed properly. While the application is still shown in English, Test Run now allows users to enter virtually any character they wish into their spreadsheets and within Test Run itself.

Beta 7 also introduces native Excel spreadsheet support. What does that mean? In previous versions of Test Run users were required to import and export CSV files to and from Excel and Test Run. It was not technically difficult, but it was an extra step that just made integration with the most common QA tool more cumbersome. With Beta 7 one can upload and download Excel spreadsheets directly, with no other intermediate steps necessary.

Those are the two major changes in Beta 7, but there are a number of other feature enhancements and bug fixes as well.

Continue reading "Announcing improved international support, native Excel spreadsheet support and more!" »

Normally I wouldn't bother posting about feature enhancements until after they have been released, but I have been working on some improvements this weekend that I wanted to share with Test Run's Beta testers. First, thanks to all those who are submitting feedback and feature requests. With each release I get more and more users, and as a result more and more feedback. So each release seems to be getting better and better.

Continue reading "Beta 7 Preview" »

Since Test Run was released less than a month ago it has been downloaded over 300 hundred times and currently has over 100 registered users using Test Run Online.

Thanks to all the feedback we have received as result of having so many users using the product the latest release, Beta 6, is a significant enhancement over Beta 5, to say the least. It's change log is the largest to date. Aside from addressing some long standing issues like better enforcment over user assigned permissions, a lot of refinement has being done as well.

For example, many users told me that they did not understand tags, which was unfortunate because mastering tags is one the keys to mastering Test Run. Tags enable users to easily generate test plans based upon a few simple keywords. To help educate users more about this feature, if a user attempts to create a test plan when they have not yet tagged any test cases they are presented with some contextual help documentation to lead them on the right path. On the other hand, if they have tags in their account, then those tags are listed for them to select from.

And that is only one example of how we have been trying to make Test Run easier to use. I wish I had the time though to detail every single enhancement contained in this most recent release, but it just isn't practical. If you are curious about a summarized list of enhancements, please continue reading this post, or take a look at the real time change log.

As always, thanks to all the user who sent feedback. I think you will all be happy to see your requests now in the product. Keep that feedback coming, and we will keep the releases flowing.

Continue reading "Beta 6 Released" »

An important aspect of companies today, and what I believe blogs have helped businesses achieve to a large extent, is an increased transparency into their business. Business owners are sharing with their customers more and more about their product development process and inner workings of their company. Doing so enables them to to build stronger and closer relationships with their users and customers.

At Test Run we feel that this transparency is also important and critical to our customers. That is why we just added the "What's coming" page to our website. On this page customers can view the current change log of our product as it is being developed. That way customers can see what bugs have been fixed, and what features have been added in near real time.

Rest assured that critical bugs, like security and data integrity issues, are resolved as soon as they are discovered in Test Run Online, while users of the downloadable version of Test Run will pick up those changes only after they download and install the latest version.

One of the reasons we opted to release this product early was to give our customers enough time to shape the product before it was officially released. If you are a user, or even if you are just evaluating Test Run for your company or use, we would love to hear from you directly:

What specific features are you looking for in Test Run?

Continue reading "Calling all users: we want your feature requests!" »

We am very interested in hearing from customers who have used the product and to learn what their impressions have been so far. If you are a user of Test Run and could spare a moment, please leave a comment and let us know what you think of our product.

Also, we am looking for users whose companies might be interested in becoming a reference customer to be listed among our other customers. If your company is interested your company will qualify for a free license of Test Run once it is officially released. Please contact us if you are interested and we will follow up personally.