User roles and work flows

IBM® Rational® Quality Manager is designed to be used by test teams of all sizes and supports a variety of user roles and work flows.

By default, Rational Quality Manager includes the following predefined user roles:

Your team can create new roles as needed. For example, you can create roles for functions outside of the test organization, such as Development manager, Program manager, Product Manager, User Experience engineer, and so on.

When you first install the product, all permissions are enabled for all of the default roles. When your administrator creates user IDs, each user ID is assigned a role. Your team can configure the roles, so that certain functions are enabled or disabled for each role. For example, you might want to disable a Tester's ability to save a test plan or a Lab manager's ability to run a test suite.

Note: Only a user with administrative rights can configure roles and add user IDs. Configuring roles requires the Rational Team Concert client.

Because roles are configurable, each test team can customize Quality Manager to suit their needs, and because no two teams are exactly the same, there is no one set of roles that will work for everyone.

The following diagram shows one possible work flow through Quality Manager for a test team consisting of a test manager, test lead, tester, and lab manager. The table that follows lists several potential activities for each of these roles. The diagram and table are provided only as an example. Your team might use a different set of roles and a different work flow.

In addition, the diagram implies that each task follows sequentially, whereas in reality most tasks can be acted on simultaneously.

Quality Manager flow diagram
User role Tasks Product area used
Test manager
  • Review Home page
  • Create and edit test plans and test cases
  • Review reports
  • Review and approve test plans and test cases
  • Approve test plans and test cases
  • Assign work items
  • Run reports to track project status
  • Monitor status and requirements
  • Monitor traceability
  • Version test plans

Home Home page

Requirements Requirements

Planning Planning

Report Report

Test lead
  • Review Home page
  • Create test cases
  • Associate requirements to test cases
  • Run reports to track project status
  • Define test environments
  • Approve test cases
  • Create test execution records
  • Create lab resource requests
  • Review team information
  • Assign work items
  • Create defects

Home Home page

Requirements Requirements

Planning Planning

Construction Construction

Report Report

Defect Defect

Tester
  • Review Home page
  • Review work items
  • Create manual tests
  • Create test cases
  • Create test execution records
  • Run test execution records using manual and automated scripts
  • Reuse test scripts
  • Request lab resources for testing
  • Create defects

Home Home page

Home Home page

Construction Construction

Lab Management Lab Management

Defect Defect

Lab manager
  • Review Home page
  • Fulfill requests for lab resources

Home Home page

Lab Management Lab Management

Related concepts
Test plans
Test cases
Permissions and roles

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