diff --git a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/CHANGES.txt b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/CHANGES.txt
index b529c35cd8e..c834739f3a0 100644
--- a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/CHANGES.txt
@@ -1801,6 +1801,9 @@ Release 0.23.0 - Unreleased
     MAPREDUCE-3259. Added java.library.path of NodeManager to
     ContainerLocalizer in LinuxContainerExecutor. (Kihwal Lee via acmurthy) 
 
+    MAPREDUCE-3279. Fixed TestJobHistoryParsing which assumed user name to be
+    mapred all the time. (Siddharth Seth via acmurthy)
+
 Release 0.22.0 - Unreleased
 
   INCOMPATIBLE CHANGES
diff --git a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/hadoop-mapreduce-client/hadoop-mapreduce-client-hs/src/test/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapreduce/v2/hs/TestJobHistoryParsing.java b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/hadoop-mapreduce-client/hadoop-mapreduce-client-hs/src/test/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapreduce/v2/hs/TestJobHistoryParsing.java
index b4036cbdfa7..7520efb12a0 100644
--- a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/hadoop-mapreduce-client/hadoop-mapreduce-client-hs/src/test/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapreduce/v2/hs/TestJobHistoryParsing.java
+++ b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/hadoop-mapreduce-client/hadoop-mapreduce-client-hs/src/test/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapreduce/v2/hs/TestJobHistoryParsing.java
@@ -95,7 +95,8 @@ public void testHistoryParsing() throws Exception {
     JobHistoryParser parser = new JobHistoryParser(in);
     JobInfo jobInfo = parser.parse();
 
-    Assert.assertEquals("Incorrect username ", "mapred", jobInfo.getUsername());
+    Assert.assertEquals("Incorrect username ", System.getProperty("user.name"),
+        jobInfo.getUsername());
     Assert.assertEquals("Incorrect jobName ", "test", jobInfo.getJobname());
     Assert.assertEquals("Incorrect queuename ", "default",
         jobInfo.getJobQueueName());
@@ -182,7 +183,7 @@ public void testHistoryParsing() throws Exception {
         Integer.parseInt(jobSummaryElements.get("numMaps")));
     Assert.assertEquals("Mismatch in num reduce slots", 1,
         Integer.parseInt(jobSummaryElements.get("numReduces")));
-    Assert.assertEquals("User does not match", "mapred",
+    Assert.assertEquals("User does not match", System.getProperty("user.name"),
         jobSummaryElements.get("user"));
     Assert.assertEquals("Queue does not match", "default",
         jobSummaryElements.get("queue"));