CTAL-TTA: Certified Tester Advanced Level Technical Test Analyst

The provided pseudo code for the Answer program shows a WHILE loop that will always execute because the condition for the loop to terminate (a >= d) is never met within the loop's body. This results in an infinite loop. Additionally, since the value of 'b' is initialized with 'a + 10' and 'a' starts from a value that is read and then set to 2, 'b' will never be equal to 12. Therefore, the 'THEN' branch of the IF statement, which includes 'print(b)', is unreachable. These are control flow anomalies because they represent logic in the code that will not function as presumably intended.

The pseudo code provided for the Price program shows a potential for an infinite loop due to the way the 'Del_Charge' variable is being manipulated. The loop is set to continue 'WHILE Del_Charge > 0', and within the loop, 'Del_Charge' is initially set to 5 and then potentially decreased by 2 if 'Sale_Value > 60000'. However, at the end of each loop iteration, 'Del_Charge' is increased by 1. This means that if 'Sale_Value' is not greater than 60000, 'Del_Charge' will not decrease and will instead increment indefinitely, causing an infinite loop. Even if 'Sale_Value' is greater than 60000, the decrement by 2 could be negated by the subsequent increments if the loop runs enough times, potentially leading to an infinite loop situation. There is no guaranteed exit condition once the loop is entered, which is a control flow anomaly.

Cyclomatic complexity is a measure of the number of linearly-independent paths through a program's source code, which is often used as a measure of the complexity of a program. The control flow graph provided represents the logic of a software component and has more than 5 nodes with decision points, indicating that the complexity would exceed the maximum allowed value of 5. The calculation for cyclomatic complexity is V(G) = E - N + 2P, where E is the number of edges, N is the number of nodes, and P is the number of connected components. In this case, the calculated cyclomatic complexity exceeds the allowed threshold, thus a defect should be reported.

In the provided pseudo-code for the Bingo program, the variable MIN is used in the statement MIN = MIN + A without being initialized with a value beforehand. This represents a classic 'use before define' anomaly, as the variable MIN must have an initial value before any operation like addition can be performed on it.

For an exploratory test session, it is important to consider: a) The user roles specified in the user stories, to ensure testing aligns with user expectations and requirements. b) The level of coverage and efficiency to be achieved, to ensure the session is comprehensive and effective. d) The need for documentation of findings from the session, to ensure insights and issues are captured and communicated effectively.

These factors ensure that the exploratory testing is focused, efficient, and its outcomes are actionable and beneficial to the development process .

For a Medium risk mission- or safety-critical system, the best testing approach includes a combination of automated tests, exploratory tests, and manual black-box tests. Option B is the most comprehensive, advocating for automated tests to ensure reliability and repeatability, highly recommending exploratory tests to cover unforeseen scenarios, and recommending manual black-box tests to cover standard use cases. This multifaceted approach ensures thorough testing coverage essential for medium risk, safety-critical systems.

In the context of API testing, the defect types generally found are related to the specific interactions with the API, such as issues with data formatting, handling, validation, and the sequencing or timing of API calls. Architectural structural complexity is not typically a defect that would be identified at the API testing level. API tests are concerned with the interface and immediate integration points, not the overarching system architecture, which would be more relevant to design or system-level testing.