The Pirate Heuristic

"Bad artists copy. Good artists steal."
-Pablo Picasso

The pirate heuristic says this, when you run out of ideas - steal someone else's.



Obtaining tools, ideas, and information to support your testing effort is critical to your success as a tester. When you have trouble recognizing the resources you have available it's important not to forget that great testers know that it's ok to steal. Look at past test plans, bug taxonomies, the notes of the person next to you, the Google super-mind, and any other resource you have available to you that you can exploit for your testing.

Don't break any laws (stealing tools illegally or stealing from a competitor), but make sure you aren't ignoring the wealth of ideas that surround you every day.

When you get stuck while generating ideas call upon the pirate heuristic.