Silk Test Interview Question 73: Silktest vs QTP comparasion?

I'm always surprised to read in the requirement for Automation Test Engineer something like "5+ years test automation experience, including contributing to automation framework development and developing and maintaining Seque SilkTest or HP / Mercury QTP test suites". For me it means that hiring company does not have any test automation tools at all and you will be the very first test automation engineer to hire. In the same time I consider this QA interview questions "describe advantages and disadvantages of HP QTP vs SilkTest" as perfectly valid software engineer interview question.

Let's take a look on both test automation tool and compare QTP vs Silktest without any comparison tables.

HP QTP and Silktest have one major drawback in common there is no a single HP QTP book or SilkTest book published yet except tutorials you get in the box. It means in case you want to advance your career as test automation engineer you have to take an expensive courses.

HP QTP fits more for less technical tester who will just try to do a basic record-and-playback. The Quality Assurance Engineer with object oriented programming experience should select SilkTest as tool in case s/he wants to treat automated testing as real development project.

Borland SilkTest works with 4Test scripting language and Java programming language with a help of Silk4j Eclipse Plugin, while HP QTP works with a scripting language implemented on top of VBScript. In both cases you need to have someone familiar with language. Consider to take a look on Selenium, because Selenium allow to code test scripts in Java, .Net, Perl, Python, Ruby and PHP.

Most critical part in selection test automation tool is what type of application you want to test. SQA Engineer should evaluate HP QTP, Silktest and probably Selenium against testing requirement and then make a decision.

Update
A few QTP books have been released recently on market, for detailed review look at review Best Books for QTP

SilkTest Jobs

In the past few months, everyone has noticed a major shakeout in tech industry. Many Bay Area technology companies announced major layoffs or even have shut their doors. As result, salaries and hourly rates are going down. I just noticed on Bay Area Craigslist this open SilkTest contractor position. Don't you think that $40 per hour is very low for QA Tester with the knowledge of SilkTest, Python, Perl, VBScript and C++?

Location: Santa Clara
Duration: 4.5 month
Rate: $40/hr

Solid software company is looking for a QA Tester with solid SilkTest experience.

Must have:
- Authoring, implementing, and maintaining automation test libraries and scripts using SilkTest - Automation experience
- Ability to work with QA engineers to convert manual test procedures into automated systems
- Scripting experience (Python, Perl, VBScript)
- Programming with C++ is ideal

SilkTest Interview Question 72: How to use SilkTest in agile testing?

I believe there is no doubt that certain agile manifesto principles, such as "welcome changing requirements, even late in development" or "deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale" would make SilkTest test automation engineer wince. Does it mean SilkTest that automated script for complicated business requirement created yesterday won't work tomorrow or test automation engineer would have less time to develop SilkTest scripts which can transform as often as requirement? Fortunately Silk Test works very well in agile environment. The agile development delivers new functionality every round, and this requires automated regression testing. The automation test engineer has to work in parallel with development team on automated tests. The crucial point for successful implementation of SilkTest scripts is making sure that the developers name all object, one more helpful approach is to set up daily continuous builds and run the scripts to make sure that the new build didn't break any SilkTest 2008 scripts.