Yeah, I brought that up to them. I mean, hell, we've already bought it so why not use it?
Apparently there are security issues we'll have to deal with. Our customer is outside our firewalls and getting "holes punched" for their access is extremely difficult at best. Hosting it outside our firewalls provides the same difficulty...they don't want to punch holes for our teams to access. Fun huh?
I've used SPS, the whole portal, and even worked at one place where MS Content Management Server, SPS, etc. were all integrated. So cool, but apparently a nightmare for our admins.
You're hitting the point of my frustration. All the docs are in Word, PPT, Visio, XLS, PDF, some HTML, etc. We're just fighting for a way to make this happen elegantly without major pain on our already understaffed doc team. They provide us with a good deal of extremely useful information as our office's "information brokers" and we'd like to keep them happily humming along doing what they do best...gathering and presenting seemingly random bits of arcane information into cogent thoughts for the rest of the organization (since I used to be one of their kind I am especially aware of their pain).
Time isn't a major issue. Management is willing to go for a phased approach, but they want something "elegant" and relatively quick to push out the user manuals first. Those have already been broken into multiple PDFs (broken down by chapter), first by creating Master Documents in MS Word, then tinkering with each of the chapters to make them PDF halfway decently.
It really boils down to finding a reasonable compromise of ease of use (for doc team), price (for mgmt/customers), and interface (for end-users).
Your input is most appreciated however. Very though provoking. I'll present it to management to show them that I'm NOT the only one who thinks the request is "slightly out of order."
I've used Rational TestStudio and EnterpriseStudio for doing just this sort of thing.
Other than having to give up your left testicle to afford it (I volunteered my boss for it), it proved itself quite capable of handling unit, integration, system, regression, and full-bore load testing. If you're also planning to do any load testing the "virtual users" will cost you the other testicle (I'd suggest you use multiple levels of management's PHBs - they get skittish after a couple of roosters become hens).
I'd recommend "floating licenses" over "node-locked" licenses if your testers are geographically dispersed.
On the upside; it's extremely easy to use, no problem integrating manual tests into the automated test suites, no problems integrating datapools from Excel spreadsheets (well, any CSV/TSV spreadsheet really). Our only problem arose with Java testing...none of us had any experience with Java other than simple javascripts for menus, so I can't honestly provide you with a review on its performance there.
I was part of the team that made the selection of the test suite for our company and customer.
We evaluated Rational, Mercury, and a few others I can't recall. We found Rational was easier to implement and integrate with our requirements management tool (which just happened to be Rational's RequisitePro). None of us - testers, tech writers, analysts, and management found the Mercury interface as easy to work with. I've seen Mercury put to use in quite a few places and all seemed to get the job done. I don't think you'll be poorly served by either.
YMMV
So, in the end (1) find one that can handle the specifics of your project (Mercury handles ActiveX better), (2) fits your budget, and (3) one who's interface doesn't make your work more difficult because you're having to constantly find things or look up how to perform them.
Now, if load testing HTML only is a desire, you may want to evaluate OpenSTA (www.opensta.org). It's free (in both respects) and a breeze to implement and use.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, I brought that up to them. I mean, hell, we've already bought it so why not use it?
Apparently there are security issues we'll have to deal with. Our customer is outside our firewalls and getting "holes punched" for their access is extremely difficult at best. Hosting it outside our firewalls provides the same difficulty...they don't want to punch holes for our teams to access. Fun huh?
I've used SPS, the whole portal, and even worked at one place where MS Content Management Server, SPS, etc. were all integrated. So cool, but apparently a nightmare for our admins.
Don't know anything about DocBook, but I will check it out. Thanks for the pointer!
Is it difficult to use? What about version control?
You're hitting the point of my frustration. All the docs are in Word, PPT, Visio, XLS, PDF, some HTML, etc. We're just fighting for a way to make this happen elegantly without major pain on our already understaffed doc team. They provide us with a good deal of extremely useful information as our office's "information brokers" and we'd like to keep them happily humming along doing what they do best...gathering and presenting seemingly random bits of arcane information into cogent thoughts for the rest of the organization (since I used to be one of their kind I am especially aware of their pain).
Time isn't a major issue. Management is willing to go for a phased approach, but they want something "elegant" and relatively quick to push out the user manuals first. Those have already been broken into multiple PDFs (broken down by chapter), first by creating Master Documents in MS Word, then tinkering with each of the chapters to make them PDF halfway decently.
It really boils down to finding a reasonable compromise of ease of use (for doc team), price (for mgmt/customers), and interface (for end-users).
Your input is most appreciated however. Very though provoking. I'll present it to management to show them that I'm NOT the only one who thinks the request is "slightly out of order."
I've used Rational TestStudio and EnterpriseStudio for doing just this sort of thing.
Other than having to give up your left testicle to afford it (I volunteered my boss for it), it proved itself quite capable of handling unit, integration, system, regression, and full-bore load testing. If you're also planning to do any load testing the "virtual users" will cost you the other testicle (I'd suggest you use multiple levels of management's PHBs - they get skittish after a couple of roosters become hens).
I'd recommend "floating licenses" over "node-locked" licenses if your testers are geographically dispersed.
On the upside; it's extremely easy to use, no problem integrating manual tests into the automated test suites, no problems integrating datapools from Excel spreadsheets (well, any CSV/TSV spreadsheet really). Our only problem arose with Java testing...none of us had any experience with Java other than simple javascripts for menus, so I can't honestly provide you with a review on its performance there.
I was part of the team that made the selection of the test suite for our company and customer.
We evaluated Rational, Mercury, and a few others I can't recall. We found Rational was easier to implement and integrate with our requirements management tool (which just happened to be Rational's RequisitePro). None of us - testers, tech writers, analysts, and management found the Mercury interface as easy to work with. I've seen Mercury put to use in quite a few places and all seemed to get the job done. I don't think you'll be poorly served by either.
YMMV
So, in the end (1) find one that can handle the specifics of your project (Mercury handles ActiveX better), (2) fits your budget, and (3) one who's interface doesn't make your work more difficult because you're having to constantly find things or look up how to perform them.
Now, if load testing HTML only is a desire, you may want to evaluate OpenSTA (www.opensta.org). It's free (in both respects) and a breeze to implement and use.
Hope this helps.