MD5 Checksum – fsum, Fsum Frontend and Md5Checker

MD5 Checksums are used to check the integrity of files. They are normally a 32 hexadecimal number (128-bit hash value) created by a cryptographic has function.

In short, a MD5 Checksum is useful for identifying a corrupt, incorrect or missing file.

Using fsum to create and verify a MD5 Checksum

fsum.exe is a command line application and therefore ideally used with batch files.

Creating a MD5 Checksum with fsum.
>fsum -d”d:\verification” -jnc -jm -r *.* >”d:\verification\CHECKSUM.md5″

Image 1 - The Checksum.md5 content (opened in Notepad)

I have changed two files to show the status of warning and errors. The document “Verification Testing.doc” has been deleted and the file content of “ReadMe.txt” has been changed.

Verify a MD5 Checksum with fsum.
>fsum -d”d:\verification” -c CHECKSUM.md5

fsum identifies a warning and an error.

Image 2 - fsum output

Options used:
-d <directory>, set working directory
-jnc, suppress comments
-jm, use MD5 format
-r, recurse subdirectories
-c, check sum against given list

Using Fsum Frontend to verify a MD5 Checksum.

Fsum Frontend also identifies a warning and an error.

Image 4 - The Fsum Frontend interface

Fsum Frontend can calculate 4 different checksums (SFV, MD5, SHA1 and SHA2), and it also allows 96 different hashes for files and text strings.

Mounting ISO files with Pismo File Mount

Pismo File Mount provides a process to mount an ISO file (also ZIP, CISO, CFS, ISZ, DAA files) as a read-only, virtual folder or mapped drive. A number of standard ISO formats are supported; like ISO-9660, Joliet extensions and UDF 1.02.

Pismo File Mount is the graphical user interface for the command line application pfm.exe.

Mounting and unmounting an ISO file via pfm.exe:
>pfm mount “Test Tools.iso”
>pfm unmount “Test Tools.iso”

Using Windows Explorer

Mounting a ISO file as a Virtual Folder

Right-click the ISO image, select Quick mount

Image 1 - Pismo File Mount: Quick Mount

Mounting a ISO file as a Mapped Drive

Right-click the ISO image, select Mount…
From Map drive drop down select a drive, click Mount

Image 2 - Pismo File Mount: Mount Options

Defect Management with Microsoft Visual Studio Team System – Test Tool Candidate 3

Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008 Test Edition provides a defect management solution which integrates into the Team System environment.

Visual Studio Team System 2008 has been designed with a number of inbuilt test tools. One of these test tools is for defect management. Work items are used in Team System to manage work.

A bug work item has four states:

• New -Test Engineers or Software Engineers are raising a bug.
• Active - Software Engineer is investigating bug and potentially fixing the bug.
• Resolved - Test Engineers is retesting bug (the Engineer should closes or re-actives the bug they opened).
• Closed – Bug is closed, however it is available to be re-activated if bug reappears.

Also the reason field, complements the state field, by indicating why a bug is in a given state.

Image 1 - The states & reasons of bug work item

Worlds #1 PDF Creator – Test Tool Candidate 2

PrimoPDF provides a virtual printer for applications that have a print option.

As a test tool, one can capture test evidence of the application’s printable documents, in the form of a PDF.

Image 1 - Output optimized screen PDF customization for each time you print

Merging PDFs with BeCYPDFAsm

BeCyPDFAsm (BeCy Portable Document Format Assembler) is ideal for merging individual pages from several PDF files.

Image 1 - Source & output files are defined on the same screen

Clean Uninstalling of Applications – Test Tool Candidate 1

Revo Uninstaller Portable, this portable application can identify leftover uninstalled information, in the form of files, folders and registry entries. It also has a number of other useful feature as a window’s utility.

As a test tool, one can use the information to create issue reports, detailing the information that was not uninstalled.

Image 1 - Revo Uninstaller Portable

For example uninstalling the application Yahoo! Toolbar has 246 leftover Registry items and 6 leftover files and folders. This potentially could lead to issues when installing different versions of the application on the same machine.