I admit that this book perhaps gives me an inordinate amount of pleasure. I have a completely ridiculous number of books on software and systems testing on my shelves, beginning with Glenford Myers’ brilliant classic from 40 years ago [1] and then continuing with many tens of additional books. Each one seemingly got thicker, but very seldom added anything of substance to the actual field of testing. Some included bits and pieces for solving special cases, but nothing that could not have been simply derived from Myers’ book by anyone with commonsense. (It’s perhaps trivially amusing that both are published by Wiley.)

Finally, here is a book full of substance, with real solutions to real-life hard-to-solve issues in systems testing (and, of course, software). Many years ago, I briefly met Professor Kenett, a friend of a friend, though we have not had contact in several decades. I need to commend particularly chapter 20, “Analytics in Testing Communication Systems,” a field I have worked in for many years. The chapter begins:

Customer experience is the heart of communication services. Everyone, at almost any minute of the day, is communicating. When you pick up a phone, surf the web, watch TV, or use a home security appliance connected to a central service, you are using a communication service--and you have no tolerance for errors.

The statement may sound trivial, even banal. It is far from it.

People tend to characterize the 21st century as the Information Age. That may be a suitable epithet. However, I believe that Communication Age may turn out to be much more appropriate. Communication is critical to everything that occurs today, much more so than most people perceive. The analytical testing of these systems is critical to life, critical to societal function, and critical to economics and safety. This book presents real methods for this analytical testing, and this accomplishment is a huge step forward in testing technology.

Unfortunately, as with many books written by many people and put together by editors, there is insufficient emphasis on integrating the various chapters; each one stands alone. I would have hoped for at least a good index of all the information, as well as an integrated bibliography. Nonetheless, I highly recommend this book as a very positive step forward in testing technologies and techniques. I salute the editors for a job very well done, even if I humbly request a second edition with a bit more “aid” to the reader.