SpiraTeam

A system with virtues and aspects to improve

Komentarze: The most necessary changes that Inflectra SpiraTeam can develop in new improvements are the following: the grids can be very restrictive and do not offer the possibilities of quickly ordering the launches, in the requirements module it is where they must make more changes to increase the speed and for last I would like to see in a new version a better way to create custom reports.

Zalety:

Inflectra SpiraTeam is a product that works satisfactorily with multiple browsers such as Chome, Opera and Firefox without presenting compatibility problems, it is very easy to manage and maintain and another positive aspect is the robust integration with AxoSoft OnTime. My recommendation is to work day by day with Inflectra SpiraTeam and request technical assistance if necessary. Also, I recommend asking Inflectra to add more features in a new release. SpiraTeam has a lot to improve, but it is on the right track.

Wady:

There are many improvements that the Inflectra SpiraTeam team can implement in a new update, for example, the grids, custom reports and the requirements module. SpiraTeam should implement and add more custom reporting options, improve testing functionality, and increase the speed of the requirement module.

SpiraTeam - The HP ALM/HPQC Killer

Komentarze: My philosophy is that the tool should fit the project, not the other way round, so I use SpiraTeam as and when the project requires. All my tests begin life as Excel checklists. If we have specific requirements then I will make use of the Requirements and map them to Test Scripts to get full traceability from a requirements, through testing, through defect management to reporting of test coverage. We write and maintain our own legacy systems, so most of our projects only have high level requirements, hence there is little point using the full suite of SpiraTeam, as it is overkill for such small projects. For most projects, SpiraTeam is used as more of a project place holder at a very high level to track project details and capture any requirements documentation. It is inefficient to write test scripts in Excel for small projects and import them in to SpiraTeam and execute them from SpiraTeam, as this is a needless duplication of effort. I've implemented Exploratory Testing, so test scripts are high level one-liners, reading more like a checklist than a typical Step 1, Step 2, Step 3 style of test scripts. Familiarity with our own in-house software renders the need to write detailed step by step tests redundant. When new legislation is passed that we must comply with, I use SpiraTeam for Test Management to dot the I's and cross the T's, making use of requirements capture, test scripting, requirements mappings, test execution, defect management and Reporting.

Zalety:

Easier and more user-friendly to use than HP ALM/QC, whilst offering a similar level of comprehensive features, for a lot less outlay than HP's ALM/QC, IBM, CompuWare etc. SpiraTeam is flexible enough to be used differently for each project. For example, SpiraTeam can be used as a document repository for one project, just a test script and test execution tool for another, and as a full blown project life cycle tool encompassing requirements, tests, defects, management and reporting functions. The support provided by Inflectra is head and shoulders above the competition, showing the big boys how it should be done. Responses are prompt and with plenty of examples relevant to your industry sector to help get you going. Don't be surprised if [SENSITIVE CONTENT HIDDEN] himself replies to your support request. It seems that the company's sales team are well versed in using the software tools that they sell. For us, it is the support that wins out over any rivals. Pricing is clear and upfront, unlike some of the smoke and mirrors sales tactics used by other vendors who shall remain nameless but here are some hints ... Has Problems, It Breaks More and Don't Expect to Last Long.

Wady:

Upgrading from 5.4 to 6.0 fails. In the past upgrading other vendor tools has been a deal breaker when it failed. A tool should be able to upgrade itself without throwing any SQL errors or similar. Administrators and DBA's should not need to run any specific scripts or commands, the tool should do this automatically and without error. We are unable to take advantage of new features offered in 6.0 and beyond. Integration of any test tool with a business is not easy because the tool forces you to work its way rather than the tool supporting existing processes. I needed to write a VB script to translate/transpose my test scripts into the correct format for importing into SpiraTeam, as a consequence of the tool forcing the tester to work how the tool works.

SpiraTeam Review

Komentarze: Overall, the product is a great value. There are definitely things that can be improved though.
* Make reporting easier to use and more flexible. One of our number 1 complaints from Managers that use the system including myself is that we can't easily get data out of the system.
* Make it easier to create custom reports.
* The testing functionality is still cumbersome. We have seen our testing times increase fairly significantly since we started using the product. While some of that was expected, the tool is slow and not very efficient in some cases. For example instead of allowing multiple modules to be added at one time, the testers have to search for each one separately.
* The requirements module is slow.
* Performance of the product overall could be improved.
* Grids are restrictive. I have gotten lots of feedback with people wanting the ability to do things like double sort the grids or multiselecting certain fields like release.
* The customer service is fantastic but the reason I didn't give it an outstanding score is because I wish we had more say with enhancements. I wish we could pay you for an enhancement that was really important to us or for you to create a report for us.

Pretty Good!

Komentarze: Overall, I like SpiraTeam. There's a bunch of different ALM solutions out there. I prefer something easy of a lot of confusing functionality. SpiraTeam is somewhere in the middle. It has a good balance. I use it for keeping track of test cases, but don't use the requirements functionality. I wish we did use the Requirement functionality, but the developers I work with have a thing about NOT documenting what they are developing... In any case, I can produce the results of the test effort rather easily so the rest of the team can see where we are within the project.
Some of the annoyances are the ability to produce a report and distribute to the rest of the team. With the templates that SpiraTeam provides, I would like something a lit bit different. The templates just don't provide the information that I need. I know there is a way to modify the templates, but never had time to devote to figure it out. Also, the way arranging tests in folders and then moving tests around in the folders has been difficult over the versions of SpiraTeam. I like how tests are arranged in that way. It helps keep everything organized in a good manner, but the implementation of it is not entirely perfect. test cases often get put in the wrong place and have to spend some time moving them around. My last annoyance is how test cases are copied and pasted. When pasting a test case, it places it on the top of the test case I copied, not underneath it. That bugs me more than anything.
But when judging SpiraTeam as a whole, I do like the product, but it's those little interface annoyances that get in the way.

Zalety:

I like the concept of how test cases are arranged, within folders.

Wady:

I don't like how the concept of the folders was implemented. Often times, when copying and pasting test cases, it gets placed in the wrong location. Have to spend extra time getting test cases and folders placed in the right location.

Are you in Wagile Hell?

Komentarze: With Spira Team we are building out our B2B and B2C solutions. We use the Planning Boards for SPrint Planning and daily stand up reference. WE use the Incidents page for tracking defects and Test Cases for Test Management. We also use Requirements for High Level Requirements, decomposing into Use Cases. We can bring in third parties as required to communicate their cards.

Zalety:

Where you are in the B2B market and have tech clients who remain Waterfall in their planning, yet you are more enlightened, this is a suitable tool. It does allow you to plan your dev trains according to iterations and project onto a scrum board. At the same time it allows you to map these cards to a set of requirements. In addition, you can plan your test cases and track defects all in the one platform. Sure, you could go down the Atlassian route, Inflectra appears to be better value for money, especially when adding modules.

Wady:

Insufficient integrations available with market defacto standard testing tools. The training model is on a consulting model - not great for start ups and scale ups. Need more training videos dealing with the set up in situations of increasing complexity! Was advised that Inflectra is responsive to customer feedback feature requests. Have not experienced this yet, despite regular feedback. Because most teams spend so much time in the Planning Board, more investment is required to improve usability of this page. Its good, just not great yet. It would be great to restrict visibility of external users to specific pages or to specific cards, instead we have to create separate projects for these groups, which is not always ideal when inserting external groups into internal team work.