Cem Kaner coined the phrase scenario test by October 2003.4 He commented that one of the most difficult aspects of testing was maintaining step-by-step test cases along with their expected results. His paper attempted to find a way to reduce the re-work of complicated written tests and incorporate the ease of use cases.5
A few months later, Hans Buwalda wrote about a similar approach he had been using that he called "soap opera testing". Like television soap operas these tests were both exaggerated in activity and condensed in time.6 The key to both approaches was to avoid step-by-step testing instructions with expected results and instead replaced them with a narrative that gave freedom to the tester while confining the scope of the test.7
In this method only those sets of realistic, user activities that cover several components in the system are used as scenario tests. Development of system scenario can be done using:
In this method the focus is on how a user uses the system with different roles and environment.8[need quotation to verify]
"An Introduction to Scenario Testing" (PDF). Cem Kaner. Retrieved 2009-05-07. https://kaner.com/pdfs/ScenarioIntroVer4.pdf ↩
Buwalda, Hans (2004). "Soap Opera Testing" (PDF). Better Software (February 2004). Software Quality Engineering: 30–7. Retrieved 2011-11-16. http://www.logigear.com/logi_media_dir/Documents/Soap_Opera_Testing.pdf ↩
Crispin, Lisa; Gregory, Janet (2009). Agile Testing: A Practical Guide for Testers and Agile Teams. Addison-Wesley. pp. 192–5. ISBN 978-81-317-3068-3. 978-81-317-3068-3 ↩
Gopalaswamy, Srinivasan Desikan. Software Testing:Principles and Practice. ↩