What is the Goal of a Software Tester?

In simple words the goal of a software tester is to find bugs, find them as early as possible, and make sure they get fixed. A fundamental trait of software testers is that they simply like to break things. They live to find those elusive system crashes. They take great satisfaction in laying to waste the most complex programs. They're often seen jumping up and down in glee, giving each other high-fives, and doing a little dance when they bring a system to its knees. It's the simple joys of life that matter most to them.

When you are assigned to a software testing project, you will need to do the following things:

1. Requirement Analysis: Go through the user specification of the application you are going to test.

2. Test Architect: Write down the test conditions or test objectives from the user specs. This is equivalent to defining the architecture of the application. Do not skip this test. Say, for a calculator application the requirement says addition functionality for a calculator. Here the test objectives will be:

a. Validate that addition of two positive number gives correct result.
b. Validate that addition of one positive and one negative number gives correct result.
and so on.
3. Then write down the test cases from the above objectives. Here you will mention the detail level steps. eg

step1. Open the calculator application.
step2: click on the number 2
Step3: Click on +
Step4: Click on 3
Step5: Press = and get the result etc..

4. Test execution: At this stage you need to run the application following the test case steps and record the result.

5. Defect reporting: If step 4 gives correct result,  you mark the test case as passed. If it give a wrong result, say  

2+3 = 6 etc, then you need to log a defect. This defect will go to the developer who has developed this calculator application. He or she will fix the defect and send you the fixed application.

6. Retesting the defect: Here you need to retest the defect and, if it is actually fixed, you will close it and mark the test case as passed.