Testing is absolutely critical to the software development effort. Testing is done at many phases of the development life cycle. Therefore, testing efforts vary from company to company depending on how they implement the development process. For this discussion, do some research on the topic of software testing. You will get a lot of results, so focus on the basics so you gain an understanding of the different types of testing and when and why they should be used.

Use the information learned in your research to answer the following questions:

• Why test a program?
• What is informal or unit testing, and how is it done?
• What is system or integration testing, and how is it done?
• What is involved with ensuring testing is completed thoroughly?
• Must all parts of a program be tested? Why or why not?