How can I use the syntax of Gherkin acceptance criteria without accompanying the BDD tool?
Do you have experience writing or consuming Acceptance Criteria written with Gherkin, but don't use a BDD tool like Cucumber, Specflow, etc.? Is this method of writing acceptance criteria beneficial? Are there drawbacks? Are there any good alternatives available?
The syntax of Gherkin Acceptance Criteria should not be used. Acceptance criteria is a list of things that need to happen to satisfy the product owner. These may have one-to-many Gherkin BDD scenarios for each acceptance criteria. The other distinction is that you need to have all the acceptance criteria outlined before you can size it and pull it into a sprint or iteration. You do not and probably SHOULD NOT have every scenario outlined before you start working on the story. This leads to big upfront design. Speaking of design, many people misuse the gherkin syntax as acceptance criteria and couple it very tightly to the user interface. These Given When Then scenarios instantly morph into a detailed design. So now we're designing the screens before we finish writing the story? This is a mini waterfall...