Questions

Agriculture would be a good example of a purely competitive industry.

A test plan is the master document that contains all details pertaining to testing of the application. Its contents include:

Testing scope - what is included and what is not included in the testing of the current project 

Assumptions - what are the assumptions that are made for this project 

Milestones - major dates like when testing is going to begin, when it is planned to end, what is the trace review date, what is the production date etc. 

Resources - the resources working on this project along with their contact details 

Defect tracking mechanism - what defect tracking tool will be used, what is the SLA for fixing Critical to Low level IRs etc. 

Test management procedures - who will be notified when there is a critical IR, what reports will be sent daily, if status calls will be held daily or weekly, where will it be held, who is required to join etc. 

Work allocation - resource distribution if more projects are being tested 

Entry and exit criterion - when can a project be accepted for testing (eg. only when smoke testing passes) and when can a project be termed as testing complete (eg. when all testcases are executed and all high level bugs are fixed)

Benchmarking is the process of comparing one's business proceses and performance metrics to industry bests or best practices from other industries. Dimensions typically measured are quality, time and cost.

Income taxes are allocated to extraordinary items, discontinued operations and prior period adjustments.