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Adopting Behavior Driven Testing within Automated Testing

Adopting Behavior Driven Testing within Automated Testing

by | Jun 20, 2019 | Automation Testing, Blog | 0 comments

Behavior Driven Testing drives focus to the requirements and the business point of view, as opposed to focusing too much on testing the technical implementation. Behavior Driven Testing uses easily understandable language to broadcast product ideas. The objective of such testing is to ensure everyone on the team gains a clear understanding of testing objectives.

In line with this, Behavior Driven Testing allows non-technical people, who are in charge of business analysis and product management, to actively join the testing process. This form of software testing is gaining significant momentum since modern organizations are viewing it as a solution to challenges posed by automation testing and collaboration.

Behavior Driven Testing within Automated Testing

Some testing experts aver, “The goal of behavior driven testing is a business readable and domain specific language that allows you to describe a system’s behavior without detailing how that behavior is implemented.” (Further), “behavior driven tests in the form of plain text feature descriptions with scenarios and are typically written before anything else and verified by the non-technical stakeholders.”

Drives Collaboration

Behavior Driven Testing builds closer relationships among business analysts, QA groups, and software development teams through the Behavior Clarification Reviews. This form of software testing, lends itself well to automation testing and helps communicate requirements effectively; however, the requirements have to be verified by business analysts and testers before they reach a common ground for acceptance criteria.

Easy Review and Feedback

Behavior Driven Testing requires no development skills because this form of testing hinges on writing the test cases in natural language (which is human-readable). Hence, non-coding professionals such as business analysts can actively participate in the process of automation testing and creating automated test cases, review the same, and offer feedback for improvements.

Easy Automation

Business teams review testing scenarios, developed by manual testers; following this, an automation engineer can develop the step definitions for the scenario steps. The path to automation testing runs through the QA team, which automates the scenarios; once executed, glitches that emerge are remediated. The automated tests are run as regression tests, following which the user accepts the software by certifying that acceptance and quality criteria have been met.

QA team

Focus on Testing Behavior

Since Behavior Driven Testing focuses on testing behavior, testers can implement automation testing by building detailed automated unit tests. Testers therefore, must develop test cases keeping the scenario in mind, not just code implementation. In doing so, testers would not need to change the test, inputs, and outputs should the requirements undergo change. This makes unit Test Automation much faster, less tedious, and more accurate.

Ease of Implementation

The availability of a large range of open source Behavior Driven Testing frameworks remains key to the success of “automation testing”. “Test Automation” demands the Behavior Driven Testing layer is positioned on top of a customized framework. Subsequently, the Behavior Driven Tests are given the when-then style steps written in natural language. However, testers must implement these steps in a programming language of their choice.

Areas of Concern

Skilled technical resources are required to build and maintain the automation testing framework that will enable Behavior Driven Testing. This approach to development differs significantly from other popular automation tools. In addition, certain scenarios may emerge wherein the tests written by the manual tester (or business analysts) do not lend themselves to automation. However, Behavior Driven Testing does not require specific documentation because the feature file serves as the requirement specifications or repository of use cases.

In Conclusion:

Behavior Driven Testing (BDT) is not a frequently used term in the realm of software testing and or development. This is because the testing focuses on user behavior and not the technical performance and functions of the software, and is used to highlight the requirements of a product and the point of view of the business. Our experts understand the use of BDT as a solution and premise for implementing data driven testing – connect with us to achieve this more speedily and successfully in a consistent manner.

Ensuring Automated Software Testing is Consistently Successful

Ensuring Automated Software Testing is Consistently Successful

by | Jun 15, 2019 | Automation Testing, Blog | 0 comments

Software testing represents an integral part of modern software development cycles and processes. In recent times, automated testing processes have emerged as part of techniques designed to aid the creation of flawless software packages that conform to all mission parameters. Contemporary definitions of automated software testing indicate it “is an automatic technique where the tester writes scripts by own and uses suitable software to test the software. Like regression testing, automation testing also used to test the application from load, performance and stress point of view.”

Best Suited for Large Projects

This form of software testing is well-suited when testers are involved in projects of significant reach and scope. The utility of such Test Automation stems from the fact large projects require testing the same areas in repeated patterns. The utility extends to software development projects that have already undergone an initial manual testing process.

Reduced Testing Time

The use of automated software testing systems and procedures reduces the time spent on such exercises. These time savings can now be invested in activities wherein software coders can refine the test procedures, improve the quality of such tests, and adjust the duration of testing cycles. Further, valid Test Automation schedules, systems, and procedures can be re-used in the service of future software development plans.

Reduced Testing Time

Correct Allocation of Resources

A successful Automation Testing regimen is ideally preceded by the allocation of human resources, budgets, the delineation of testing needs, the selection of appropriate testing technology, etc. Each of these criteria, when adequately fulfilled, leads to the execution of a successful Test Automation system. Such actions require advance planning on the part of project personnel in order to meet with success in the testing mission.

Which Test Cases to Automate

The proper selection of test cases is a pre-requisite for successful Automation Testing. This action stems from the realization that not every single aspect of testing can be automated. Hence, code testers and software developers must arrive at common ground in terms of determining which test cases should be automated. In line with this, tests that must be performed only infrequently can remain outside a Test Automation regime. In contrast, test cases that run frequently and require large amounts of data must find priority inclusion in said regimes.

Focus on a single objective

When software developers set about creating Automation Testing regimes, they must retain a narrow focus on a single, stated objective. This is important to ensure the success of an automated software testing paradigm. Testers may, for instance, develop separate tests for read-only software functions and read/write functions. This approach empowers testers to use these individual tests repeatedly without invoking the whole testing regime.

Ensuring Automated Software Testing is Consistently Successful

Select the Right Testing Methodology

Automation Testing plans are best served when testers choose the right testing methodology, the correct plan, and monitor test coverage. As part of these actions, testers are required to build a pitch; this testing process validates the software product prior to delivery. In recent times, most software testers and coders have adopted the Agile testing methodology. Time savings inherent in this testing methodology drive this preference, as do consistent sprints that enhance the testing process, and higher levels of client satisfaction with the product.

Advance Preparation of Test Cases & Scenario

Experts recommend testers identify the test scenario and create test cases prior to executing Automation Testing systems & procedures. The preparation of test cases in advance allows testers and coders to identify the test execution times and potential defects in the body of computer code to be tested. Advance preparation for Test Automation also helps identify other scenarios and workflows of the application that hold potential for successful automation.

Utilize Quality Test Data

Quality test data is intrinsic for successful QA Automation. This implies that data size should be optimal and must contain information (and components) that are relevant for application testing requirements. In addition, testers should undertake best practices by perusing data sets that are combined and separated into different categories. These categories include valid data, invalid data, boundary condition, etc. As a corollary, testers must work to ensure the data that is referred for testing consistently defeats the threat of obsolescence and remains updated from time-to-time.

Review Tests Periodically

Coders and software testers must review test data and test cases at regular intervals with a view to identify the data’s validity for undergoing tests. Such actions also help identify unnecessary and outdated tests that are no longer relevant to the current test cycle. The real world outcomes of such actions includes reduced costs and maintenance efforts for software developer(s). In addition, a consistent review of tests allows developers to validate and verify the substance of tests; this casts long-term effects on the test automation project.

In Conclusion

Automated software testing is usually a neglected part of software development, which can prove to be a costly mistake. The overlooking of testing is usually the result of the many challenges it poses for testers. Detecting bugs and errors requires in-depth experience, dedicated teams, and expertise – which together ensure that even the minutest errors and bugs can be detected early on. It is good business sense for any company to outsource this and other critical software testing tasks to a professional service provider – connect with us to gain the advantage of successful automated software testing.

Optimizing Tests for Continuous Integration

Optimizing Tests for Continuous Integration

by | Apr 29, 2019 | Automation Testing, Blog | 0 comments

Continuous Integration (CI) is a powerful strategy in software development, especially in agile environments. Software testers are increasingly using the practice of Continuous Integration in automated tests for assessing test suites in terms of value.

Continuous Integration allows frequent execution of software tests and, therefore, enables testers to fix problems shortly after spotting them. With developers integrating codes into a shared repository at frequent intervals, automated tests can verify the integrations regularly if an organization has a Continuous Integration program in place.

Optimizing Tests for Continuous Integration

To optimize tests for Continuous Integration, some beneficial practices that organizations should follow are listed below, which can be effectively managed by an expert software testing company.

Creating Small, Valuable Test SuitesA leading and renowned QA company will corroborate the fact that tests can be optimized for Continuous Integration effectively if a small suite of some important, gross-level tests is created. The tests comprising the small suite should typically include build acceptance tests, build verification tests or other vital tests that can qualify the system or application for further tests. Upon the successful execution of these tests, testers can advance to other tests.

Building an Automated Testing FrameworkThe demarcation of development phases is somewhat blurred in agile environments since each new code committed by a developer triggers a new build cycle. Hence, tests runs need to be executed several times during the test phase. The inclusion of several tests in a Continuous Integration suite, together with some shell scripting, can trigger tests automatically on a regular basis. An automated testing framework enables testers to easily identify the change that causes a failed test run.

Using Automation across Different Types of TestingCompanies striving to offer top-notch QA services should ensure that the automation framework they build for optimizing tests for Continuous Integration should cover a diverse range of tests. Some of the functional and non-functional tests that should be part of the coverage of automation testing include Load testing, Performance Testing, Stress Testing, Regression Testing, Acceptance Testing, and Database testing, among others.

Updating the Test Setup for Faster ExecutionTests can be optimized for Continuous Integration if the test setup is refactored to enable a faster execution. An updated or restructured test setup code can lead to an overall improvement in testing services since failures due to timing issues or other minor problems would be avoided. For effectively refactoring the test setup, testers should first examine the performance of their tests with the existing test setup and then consider the possibility of an enhanced setup.

Replacing Sleep Statements with Wait Statements

However, for optimizing tests for Continuous Integration, testers should be smart with their wait times. Testers mostly use sleep statements as a temporary workaround for flaky tests that consistently fail due to the ongoing loading of some resources, or a non-responding back end.

Selenium Wait Statements

They should avoid sleep statements and, instead, use wait statements that end in coincidence with the occurrence of an event rather than ending after a stipulated period.

Running Tests Suites in ParallelTest suites that take a long time to execute should be broken up into different suites and run in parallel, especially to keep pace with consistent software integration. Parallel test runs, facilitated by a robust automated testing mechanism, optimize testing for Continuous Integration given frequent execution. In addition, parallel testing also leads to improved test coverage and fewer unidentified bugs.

Avoiding the Execution of Unit Tests with Integrated TestsTo optimize tests for Continuous Integration, testers must understand the difference between unit tests and integrated tests, and avoid running them together. Unit tests are aimed at basic code correction. They are fast and need to be run frequently for early detection of bugs in business logic. In contrast, integrated tests take a notably longer execution time. Identifying the cause of a failed integrated test is a complex process because of their vast span across several modules and devices.

Logging Extensively to Analyze FailureExtensive logging holds immense significance in analyzing a failed test since it uncovers the root of the problem. For this reason, extensive logging can play a key role in optimizing tests for Continuous Integration. However, extensive logging should be done only when required because it may have an adverse effect on performance. Moreover, it is pertinent to use a competent logging framework capable of identifying cases for minimal logging and exhaustive logging.

In Conclusion:

Optimizing tests for Continuous Integration has become a crucial software development practice in recent years because of its key principles of automated testing, build automation, revision control, and greater accuracy. When tests are optimized for Continuous Integration, the degree of errors during software development drops drastically owing to increased automation, quicker bug fixes, and an efficient feedback mechanism. Connect with our team of experts to help your business with this critical to success activity.

Secrets of Succeeding at Test Automation

Secrets of Succeeding at Test Automation

by | Apr 26, 2019 | Automation Testing, Blog | 0 comments

Test automation (also called automated testing) is a crucial ‘quality assurance’ process in software testing. It is essentially a ‘programming’ mechanism, which is designed by a test automation company for controlling the execution of software tests. An effective test automation process can quickly eliminate the errors or defects in software, and ensure that the software delivers the projected results.

Test automation can be described simply as ‘a software application that tests another software application.’ It is deemed a success when the actual outcomes of software testing correspond to the expected outcomes, thereby ensuring that the software meets its requirements. Some of the secrets of successful test automation companies are:

Secrets of Succeeding at Test Automation

A ‘Requirement-driven’ Approach

Test automation requires focus on the requirements of the software to be tested. When the process is aligned with business goals, the functional and non-functional needs of the software can be met effectively. Such a ‘requirement-driven’ approach can lead to comprehensive test coverage of codes, and a successful test automation initiative.

Specialists for Designing Testing Code

Success in test automation greatly depends on the testing code because the quality of the code governs the entire software testing process. Therefore, organizations using test automation should avail the services of expert who specialize at designing testing codes. A high-quality testing code does not only make the existing test automation initiative a success, but can also become an important asset for an organization in the future.

Excellent Defect Detection

The number of software bugs or defects detected by the test automation process determines the effectiveness and success of the software. The defect-detection ability of test automation validates the robustness of the testing mechanism for an organization. The failure of test automation to discover bugs can be a cause of concern and can practically make the testing process redundant.

Modular Test Plan

The test automation framework should have a modular design, so that it has the agility for changes or breaks in tests during the course of the testing process. A modular test plan, built using small and independent test cases, underscores a ‘layered’ automated testing system that facilitates the refactoring of code when required. Such a design can ensure that automation efforts match up with software development efforts of the developers.

Integration of Software Testing with Software Development

To succeed in its test automation initiatives, an organization should integrate its software testing mechanism with the software development process. This integration can lead to better testing and quicker delivery of results since test automation would help achieve the core objectives of accelerating development, offering extensive code coverage, and assisting in keeping timeline overruns in check.

Involvement of Manual Testers

Automated programming has certain limitations because of which test automation may not be a complete testing mechanism on its own. Hence, it is important for a automation testing company to combine the expertise of automation engineers with that of manual testers and domain experts. Test automation can be successful if manual testers are also involved in some part of the testing process, especially since exploratory testing and certain other tests can be carried out only by manual testers.

Top-notch Testing Infrastructure

A well-organized testing infrastructure is one of the key quality assurance assets of test automation companies. When a QA company has a good testing infrastructure, the quality of test automation initiatives can improve significantly due to better software testing and downtime management.

Identifying the Best Candidates for Automation

For test automation to be a success, it is important that testing teams identify the best candidates for automation before actually conducting automated tests. Largely, the best automation candidates are those who specialize in testing of several kinds – functional, unit, integration, regression, smoke, and performance.

Cost-effectiveness in Long Term

The special software tools used in test automation process are expensive, and can increase the overall costs for an organization. Therefore, for test automation to succeed, it is important that the process is cost-effective in the long term. To achieve this goal, employing manual testing alongside automated testing makes business sense. In addition, the repeated use of test automation in regression testing can also make the process cost-effective.

In Conclusion:

The success of test automation largely depends on its ability to run software testing quickly and repeatedly. Automated testing would be a success for an organization if it is a more convenient, effective and time saving testing process as compared to manual testing. An organization aware of the secrets of succeeding at test automation can design and implement an excellent automated testing process, which can help software achieve its expected results. Connect with us to uncover all these secrets and more.

What Are The Most Common Issues Affecting Automated Testing?

What Are The Most Common Issues Affecting Automated Testing?

by | May 11, 2019 | Automation Testing, Blog | 0 comments

In the present-day Agile Development environments, automated testing has gained immense significance. With the help of automation, testers can prepare test data, and execute complex test cases that may be located in diverse platforms.

Despite the increasing use of automated testing, there are several problems affecting the automated processes. Due to these issues, automated testing may fail to deliver any value – which makes it pertinent to highlight some of them:

Problems Rooted in the Test Automation Mechanism

Automated Testing is gaining ground in recent times because it can accelerate the release cycles of software. However, the process has certain limitations that can sometimes put a spanner in the release cycle and affect future releases.

Common Issues Affecting Automated Testing

Specifically, if there are problems with the automation script, the testing process may fail, and the testers may not know whether the failure is because of the site or the script. In addition, another problem with automation is the unrealistic expectation that each time they are executed, automated tests will be able to find new defects.

Improper Approach to Testing

Automated testing does not simply revolve around the creation of effective testing scripts. It also requires a correct testing approach in accordance with the frequent changes in the Agile Environment. Automation may not be productive for an organization with poor testing practices because it may lead to exhaustive efforts in implementing and maintaining test scripts and test suites. If tests are poorly organized and documentation is incoherent, it may be difficult for testers to generate useful test reports and metrics. It would therefore, make good business sense to hire the services of an expert software testing company for this and other realms.

Lack of Detailed Technical Knowledge of Automation Tools

A test automation company usually emphasizes the proficiency of its testers in using various automation tools. There are however, several automation tools – like Selenium, Katalon, Cucumber, Cypress, Karate, and many others – for different testing purposes, and testers may not be experts at the optimal use of a specific tool. Wrong selection of tools can hinder test coverage, and the overall costs of tools may exceed the testing budget of an organization. Choosing a company that is proficient in a wide range of such tools will get you more value for every buck spent and every effort expended as a business.

Oversight of Environment Issues during Testing

Testers performing automated tests are chiefly focused on detecting functional bugs rather than considering ‘environment issues.’ Although the delivery pipeline is the backbone of software development and delivery in DevOps, testers generally overlook the problems in the test environments, the CI server, and the deployment scripts. An oversight of ‘environment issues’ can drastically affect the development and testing effort. It can also decelerate the deployment process.

Oversight of Environment Issues during Testing

Omission of Key Scenarios

In most Agile development environments, testers often tend to miss the key scenarios because they do not give due consideration to the crucial ‘Scenario Workshop’ activity. Since the detection of bugs is associated with test scenarios, the omission of key scenarios may result in serious issue leaks into production. Therefore, if testers do not create or test a particular scenario, even repeated automated tests will not yield the desired outcome in terms of the elimination of bugs.

No Testing of the Infrastructure

The spotlight in automated testing is largely on the automation of functional tests. Given this scenario, test automation engineers often fail to consider the potential infrastructure issues during the software development and delivery process. With hardly any testing of infrastructure, some of the infrastructure failures that usually show up include failure in integration points, breakdown of communication with third-party apps, and stoppage in results to API endpoints.

High Costs Involved in Update of Test Automation

One of the biggest challenges of automated testing is the costs of maintenance. Test automation needs to be updated each time the software is changed or updated, else automated tests cannot be re-run successfully. Typically, re-running the tests manually after software change involves comparatively less effort than updating the automated tests. Hence, a number of organizations discontinue their automation initiatives because of substantial maintenance costs. By partnering with a knowledgeable and expert company that excels at automated / software testing, will get your business several advantages in addition to keeping costs down.

Organizational Problems

Automated testing is usually considered a project issue in which organizational problems are often ignored. An organization in which there are no set standards to ensure that different teams use the testing tools in a consistent manner, chances are that each team may develop its own approach to test automation. This can pose difficulties with regard to the transfer or sharing of automated tests/testers among the teams. It is prudent to outsource the QA and software testing to a professionally run company, with years of experience in this realm.

In Conclusion:

The diverse issues affecting automated testing may make it a futile effort for an organization if automation is performed wrongly and without a structured approach. For automated testing to be effective, it is pertinent that testers remain aware of the challenges that accompany the implementation of automated testing suites. In addition, automated testing should fit the overall test management strategy of an organization so that it does not cause any obstacles / bottlenecks in the software development process. Leave these apprehensions behind by connecting with us today.

Coding Skills Essential for Test Automation Career

Coding Skills Essential for Test Automation Career

by | Mar 13, 2019 | Automation Testing, Blog | 0 comments

Digitization and automation have increased in ‘stature’ significantly over the years. They have become issues inciting concern, leading to action. Technological advancements are impacting the job market, and learning new skills in jobs roles is no longer an option. While some may have been negatively impacted by the explosion of test automation services, there are benefits too.

Test Automation Career

Some jobs today, the ones that follow repetitive and structured procedures, can be easily codified in software, thereby turning over the performance of such jobs to machines. The good news is that technology does not replace humans – it just frees the human resources to do better and more advanced jobs, such as coding.

With several automation testing companies, coding skills are becoming essential to be at the top of your game in the realm of test automation services. Today coding is becoming a job for all and the future too seems to hold promise. Businesses must remain efficient, and many modern ones use computerized automation within the workflows, and highly technical systems which require skilled personnel to work with them. This transition from manual work to digital finesse is something that most business owners now see as critical, and the workforce too must understand the importance of gaining such skills. Employers and potential employees need to understand that computerization is here to stay and transitioning to this method of working sooner will help development.

Whose Job is Coding and Debugging?

While it may seem that writing code and detecting bugs is the job of a developer, but that is not true, and we will enlist some reasons as to why coding is necessary for testers. As test automation companies are on the rise, there are several roles and uses for coding skills today. Testers need coding skills to make a successful career in a top Automation Testing Company for a variety of reasons.

Testing is of two types or it can be said that it follows two distinct approaches – manual and automation. The various testing techniques – white box, black box, or grey box – require testers to have completely different set of skills. Hence if black box testing does not require a tester to be skilled at coding, white box testing is completely code driven, and testers must have these skills in order to become successful in their career at any good test automation company.

Test Automation Career

The reason testers conducting white box testing need coding skills is because of the complexity and requirements of the automation testing involved. Testers would need to assess code coverage, statement coverage, cyclomatic complexity, and other aspects, and without in-depth knowledge of coding and database, this would not be possible. During the process of testing, database verification sometimes becomes necessary, and hence testers with knowledge of SQL commands will be better equipped to deal with the issues. In addition, if SQL injection is required, coding and commands become extremely helpful in averting any possible security risks and issues.

When performing agile testing, it is important to remember that while the whole team would be answerable with regard to the quality of the software, it will be the job of the tester to work closely with programmers to write test scripts. Without knowledge of coding, creating Selenium automated tests would be impossible.

In Conclusion:

Given the dramatic changes in employment and the manner in which technology is being utilized, modern day workforce would need to consider gaining skills that may previously have not been part of the normal rules of employment – coding is one such skill. Coding is not only for highly technically qualified or technologically inclined people – with so many Software Testing Companies hiring testers and coders, there is also a rise in inexpensive training in this realm, making it easy to gain the skill. The more skills an individual is able to gain, the better will be their chances of making a great career in test automation services.

It must be remembered that coding is not just another form of work or skill. Today the software development industry needs sharp minds – proactive thinkers, sagacious individuals, and those with the expertise and fire to create algorithms far better than ever conceived. The software development and testing domain needs testers who can code – it needs those who can adapt to the new technologies and get up to speed at a professional level. Not all developers know the realm of coding as they should, and companies are looking for people who are willing to move from other roles into the role of coding – given the high demand for this role. Connect with us if you are willing to make this transition, or you are a company looking for the best team to manage your testing and coding needs.

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