PREFACE  

When I started work on the first edition of this book in 2006, I little thought that I would be drafting a preface to a third edition in 2015. My fellow authors and I have been amazed at the continuing success of this simple guide to understanding the ISTQB Foundation Certificate in Software Testing and passing the exam, yet feedback from readers who have passed the exam by using this book as their sole preparation has been steadily amassing.

In this third edition, we have tried to provide some new material and even better exam preparation resources. Many of the exercises, examples and sample questions have been updated to reflect the way the exam has evolved over the years, and for this edition we have put together a complete mock examination. This gives commentary to explain the correct answer and why each of the distracters is incorrect. Moreover, as a mock exam, the candidates can time themselves to check they are prepared for the real thing. We think that this is a major improvement on previous editions and we hope you will find it really useful.