Software Testing Archives

Technology Behemoths Know Best

by admin | Mar 18, 2019 | Software Testing, Blog | 0 comments

With the amount of technology in use today, customers expect the highest performance of software from any company, and are quick to shift to a competing company if they do not get what they want in the first instance. Top software development does not suffice today – stringent testing for QA for seamlessly working products has become quintessential to success.

It is no surprise then that there are several software testing companies today, but it would be helpful to learn about software testing services and QA from the behemoths of technology – the likes of Google, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, and Spotify. Their success does not have one ‘recipe’ but it certainly involves their laser like focus on ensuring the best quality software before ‘taking it’ to the end users.

With more than 25,000 engineers working on more than 2 billion lines of code, it would seem near impossible to maintain top quality. Right? Wrong. As the company continues to grow, their QA strategy has transformed as well. Their mammoth size does not translate to ‘big’ – instead the company prefers brief and clear tests, coupled with frequent releases, which allows them to have a better control on any changes that their users may experience and resolve any issues quickly and effectively.

The automated testing is driven by a code coverage tool that obtains the large amounts of data for them. The code coverage is always at maximum using some different techniques, which depend on the language of the code. They use PHPUnit to test PHP, forming a massive part of the framework for Facebook. Developers, dedicated testers, and the software itself, are responsible for running tests. Developers instantly receive a notification of any failed tests, and these notifications are logged into a database to which developers have instant access.

The great part about Facebook is their approach and mindset towards QA and the testing process – they accept their flaws and empower employees to write tests for their code. This means code ownership and responsibility, which in turn ensures top quality of software. To accelerate these efforts, the line of code written by one employee is reviewed by another. This not only encourages the employees to write top quality code, but ensures that the reviewer is able to objectively check defects and or suggest any changes and improvements. Best coding practices and new code therefore, permeate the company without any extra effort.

While Amazon’s lack of QA infrastructure and number of QA professionals has been questioned and even criticized, the company remains unshaken. Their stance is that their ratio of testers to developers is not an input but rather an output variable. When they notice changes in customer behavior in terms of decrease in customers due to website issues, the company accelerates their testing efforts. Given that the company’s development and deployment processes are so advanced and established – they are known for installing software every 11.6 seconds – they do not see the need for elaborate testing processes. Their whole approach is towards making software easy to use and adopt, and in the event of a failure the software easy to recall.

Testers and developers are treated at par here, with equality of pay. Their higher ratio of testers to developers is due to the fact that a major portion of their revenue is from products that can be shipped to be installed on the computers of their customers. The company therefore would rather spend time and money on ensuring that their products are top quality before they are shipped to customers – this is better than ramping up the products later in case they are found with bugs or issues.

For Spotify the priority remains product stability and the ability to test the product over time. Looking at quick fixes is not part of the culture at Spotify, as they aim to maintain quality and coverage at all times. The software development teams are termed as tribes and squads, responsible for certain areas. This ‘division’ helps not only to meet the objectives of quality assurance, but also keeps a synergy between the product and development teams. The company’s ability to scale development comes from testing automation, but they are careful not to use this as a ‘treatment’ or solution for every issue with quality. Test automation is used as a tool to help QA engineers become more effective, and to keep their focus on the goal of holistic product quality.

The increasing emphasis on quality comes from the need of all businesses to deliver software to their clients / customers. Depending on the quality of software, a company can either reach its business goals or cause itself major problems. While the behemoths of technology can provide guidance, each business must find its own unique approach to QA and software testing. The good news is that it is easy to choose from the many testing companies offering software testing services. You just need a partner with expertise, experience, and knowledge about the tools and platforms, and the pertinent approach to QA for your company – connect with us!

Is your Website Ready for Peak Traffic on Open Enrollment?

by admin | Mar 16, 2019 | Software Testing, Blog | 0 comments

With so many companies, products, and services the consumer is spoiled for choices, and it has therefore, also become exceedingly tough to decide instantly in favor of a particular offering. People now take time to research, gather information, check customer reviews, and do whatever is required to make an informed decision. However, this in-depth scrutiny bodes well for companies – it gives them the opportunity to draw more traffic to their websites, but the spike in traffic is something that they must be prepared to face. When open enrollment for products such as insurance offerings, it is critical for a company to ensure that their website is ready to manage the load.

Load testing and performance testing play a critical role in ensuring that the apps, APIs (application programming interfaces) and websites are running at optimum ability. These tests conducted only by a top performance testing services company will prevent memory leaks, low response times, and poor user experience. The busy customer of today is eager to work with companies offering seamless user experience during open enrollment, top quality products, and efficient service, and are unforgiving of companies unable to live up to their expectations.

Any top class QA testing company will tell you that testing for peak traffic can never be enough or too early. Preparing for open enrollment for example, it would make business sense to plan sufficiently and test regularly. The aim of performance testing and load testing is to discover bugs, errors, and to know the peak load that the apps and websites can manage. Finding these issues obviously will not suffice, and hence time and resources would be required to fix the problems and make improvements where necessary. Post fixing the issues, tests would need to be conducted once more to ensure that the systems are performing at their optimum.

As you ramp up the tests, ensure that your performance testing service partner, monitors the results and provides proper documentation for each level before ramping up to the next level. An expert performance testing company, will run a functional test to ensure that functionality of the apps and websites are running as required, followed by a calibration test to ascertain the performance of the platform and any problems associated with its functioning. Once these tests are done with satisfactory results, running a performance test would make sense.

The next step would be to run a stress test / load test. This will ascertain how well the site will perform under added ‘pressure’ / load especially during times of open enrollment when traffic increases significantly. If your company has such periods of peak traffic / open enrollment times, stress testing will ensure that issues with respect to capacity, limitations, stability, and usability are resolved before the apps and websites are hit by high loads.

It is important to note that normal performance and performance testing are necessary and must replicate the actual traffic scenarios as closely as is possible. Guesswork or predictions of performance could prove costly, and it is highly recommended to work with an experienced partner who can test the limits and capacity of your apps and websites regularly and provide round the clock support.

Experts in the realm of performance testing will understand the importance of not only criteria for success, but for failure as well during the testing phase. By setting the failure criteria, there would be transparency in the communication and your business would have upfront answers on whether the system failed to perform as per the service level agreement or from the business perspective. The experienced team of professionals working with your service partner would be able to lay down the criteria which would need to be the threshold during testing. They would also have the right testing tools, methodologies, and technologies to run the tests required to ensure that your company’s systems work smoothly under both normal and stress conditions such as open enrollment.

Scaling quickly from a few to millions of users is no mean task. Open enrollment, holiday seasons, and other such times can prove extremely stressful and even risky for a business if the applications and websites do not run as per the user expectations. The good news is that it does not require your business to hire extra personnel or learn new technologies to combat these high traffic scenarios. Connect with us for ongoing commitment, support, and in-depth know how of all such situations and more, and get ready to rake in the ‘spoils’ of the business that seamlessly working apps and websites would bring.

The Saga of Quality Assurance and Software Testing

by admin | Mar 14, 2019 | Software Testing, Blog | 0 comments

If we look at ancient constructions and architecture, we can see how people began to raise the standards of what they did. Most of those structures continue to stand tall and beautiful even today. Before the industrial era, Guilds monopolized the markets – they were a union of craftsmen. They took on the responsibility of ascertaining the quality of good and services offered by the members – the masters of the guild would perform inspections in a bid to ensure that quality was maintained. This meant that quality was dependent on the view and mindset of a person or a group of persons. However, slowly specialization became the order of day, thereby taking quality from being focused on a person to being process oriented.

It is also necessary to understand how the failures, challenges, and successes of the past affect our view of quality as we know it today. Quality Assurance, Testing, and Quality Control are terms often used in the realm of quality, but it is incorrect to use them as analogous terms, since there are some significant differentiations. However, using these terms interchangeably has its roots in the origin and the fact that the implementation of each, intersect in the realm of software development.

Any top quality QA company will tell you that QA is a proactive process, aimed at preventing problems and issues. The emphasis for QA companies therefore would be to include meticulous planning, diligent documentation, and close attention to the guidelines required to ensure top quality software. In order to gain full understanding of the business requirements of the client and the project, QA as a process must begin at the start of the Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC). The next step would be developing a structured and robust plan to meet the required expectations and criteria. Of course, QA must continue through the SDLC to ensure quality does not fall.

QA testing companies will tell you that software quality is about the level that a system meets the specified criteria and the needs of the users. Quality of software is also about the design quality, and can be determined by scrutinizing several variables – both internal and external. External quality would be user experience, while the quality of coding would deal with the internal quality. Software testing is an integral and critical component in the process of software development because this is what maintains quality. Software testing too has undergone several and major changes during its evolution, and the evolution has been segregated into various phases based on time.

Avoid ConfusionAs mentioned earlier, QA, QC, and testing must not be used interchangeably, and to make matters simple it would suffice to look at the three as a grading of processes. While QA cements the process to build a product and assess its quality, quality control ensures that the QA process is implemented right, and testing is one component of the QC process. Software testing has seen a rather evolutionary process, resulting in its advanced form today – that of end to end framework based testing. Studies conducted on the subject discuss the evolution of this realm based on time and based on usage of tools, methodologies, and processes.

Looking Ahead and In ConclusionQA and software testing constitute important components of software development, and with companies working with limited resources in terms of personnel, time, and money, it would make sense to partner with an expert QA Outsourcing company. Not only would these professionals work within these limitations, they would also provide value added services and support. They would also be able to guide your business with regard to which process require manual testing, and which ones need automated tests. With knowledge of tools, such experienced testers would ensure that projects are completed faster and with laser like precision. The skills and knowledge of such QA and software testing companies is becoming indispensable. To gain the benefits of top class QA and software testing, connect with us today, and leave it to us to uncover the countless possibilities for your business.

Software Testing Strategies and Methodologies

by admin | Apr 16, 2019 | Software Testing, Blog | 0 comments

Testing software accurately and using several different approaches is critical to the success and quality of the software. Software testing companies use a number of testing strategies and methodologies to ensure that the application / website ‘behaves’ and performs exactly as it was fashioned and envisioned. These testing strategies and methodologies included end to end testing, system and unit testing – all aimed at ensuring top quality. It is a wise business decision to invest in the services of a renowned software testing company, which will be proficient in using all the testing methods to ensure your product is the best.

Software testing is conducted at several stages during the development of software, and has many different facets – including defining testing before building and consistent testing. Testers prefer to use automated tests for regular and routine tests in order to save time. The need and objective of using a number of testing strategies and methodologies has to do with ensuring that the software would be able to run optimally in several environments and devices across platforms and operating systems. Software testing is bifurcated into functional and non-functional testing, and these together ensure that only the very best quality software is released to the market, which in turn means that it can be easily adopted by the end users. Functional and non-functional testing using the right strategies and methodologies helps to build a robust and sustainable testing framework.

Unit TestingThis constitutes the first level of testing, and is usually conducted by developers. This step of testing ensures that at the code level the individual ‘units’ of the software function as designed. The developers typically write the test scripts and run the tests before they pass the software or ‘unit’ to the testing team. While manual testing is possible, automating will help to expand test coverage and would speed up delivery cycles. Given that this is an early stage testing, finding bugs and defects would be easier and fixing them would be simpler and faster too. A company offering top software testing services will serve as a guide and leader in all aspects of testing.

Performance TestingThis is conducted to assess the ‘performance’ of an application under varying real user conditions – testing for stability and responsiveness. Performance testing consists of four types of testing:

• Load testing The method of applying increasing amounts of replicated usage on the software / application / website to ascertain whether they will withstand the load they are intended to handle.
• Stress testing is a further step intended to assess the behavior of the software beyond the peak load – it is a method of testing by purposefully overloading the system until it crashes and is used to ascertain the ‘break’ point of the software and its ‘response’ to this condition.
• Endurance testing tests the ability of the software to function over sustained usage and this helps testers to uncover any memory leakages. This is a longer process than load and stress testing.

Since software testing is a fundamental activity for system development, testing must be meticulously planned, using a gamut of strategies and methodologies. Without robust testing your business could end losing revenue and a large part of its invaluable customer base. Your business would need a trusted partner to drive testing, and deliver top quality software, optimally using the strategies, methodologies and tools, and yet keeping to budget and timelines. If you seek such a value added partner, connect with us today.

Importance of Testing in the Production Environment

by admin | Apr 5, 2019 | Software Testing, Blog | 0 comments

By enlisting a software testing services company, to test in the production environment (apart from overall management of the systems of your business) your business will be able to build a higher level of confidence in its products. By performing tests in a live production environment, you would know exactly how your application behaves when a new code is randomly pushed, and this could be a significant part of your company’s future QA strategy. As a service becomes more complex it becomes tougher to simulate the production environment, and hence testing in production becomes quintessential. Some companies may not have the monies required to recreate a production environment, and they would need to conduct testing in production.

A significant amount of automation is required to ensure safe and successful testing in production. In addition, the ability to design systems from scratch and an understanding of the best practices will ensure that testing in production would be conducted and completed successfully. It must be remembered that TiP is not an umbrella term and neither should it be used to describe a mix of tools and techniques. Testing in production as a process is dependent on the application and whatever is being tested. One of the major risks of TiP is business risk, if there is a loss of transactions and or the blending / mixing of test data with that of business data. This could lead to poor user experience, issues with security, and or system crash – all of which could result in financial losses and or a serious dent in the reputation of a company.

The obvious goal of testing in production would be to prevent errors and bugs from finding their way to production. After an application is deployed, an issue, even if found, could prove ineffective, and along with your experienced software testing services company, everyone in the in-house team should feel responsible for the quality. It is important to shift left in testing at every stage of the process to enable speedier feedback from integrating and testing code. Testing in production is however, a quality safeguard for the application for your business.

Ramp up the Speed of Software Testing Cycles

by admin | Feb 15, 2019 | Software Testing, Blog | 0 comments

In today’s competitive world, speed is the underlying premise whether customers are looking to receive their ordered goods faster, companies want to scale their teams or boost the quality of work in the shortest time possible, and a Software testing company would want to help your business to ramp up the speed of the testing cycles to the optimum. With the right QA company, your business would gain the best QA strategy enabling accelerated business growth. Let us look at what would help to ramp up the speed and efficiency of software testing cycles.

What cannot / is not measured cannot be improved – a top management rule. Measuring the effectiveness of the QA testing process will ensure that testing stays on track, and the team is able to monitor progress regularly. This saves time and effort in correcting errors and ensures that each team member remains cognizant of the efficacy of the strategy. Any venture is only as successful as the people working on it, and hence a cohesive strategy would mean a team that communicates effectively.

While these may be some of the top tips that enhance the speed of software testing cycles, it is not an exhaustive list. There are several other factors too that affect this process. Remaining organized and streamlining tests may seem simple, but this is usually overlooked. It would be essential to practice good management methods for testing, maintaining data accuracy, and ensuring that automation reports are consistently updated. These simple methods will ensure continuity and even if the team members change, the tests would still be easily run when required. While automation definitely speeds up testing, a top QA testing team will know when to automate and which test cases to automate. This prevents time wastage, which otherwise could prove to be a terrifying experience for testers.

Category Selected: Software Testing

People also read

Categories

Subscribe

Talk to our Experts

Amazing clients who trust us

Google

Facebook

Amazon

Microsoft

Spotify

In Conclusion

In Conclusion:

Quality Assurance in the Realm of Software Testing

Defining Quality Assurance

Types of Tests under Non-Functional Testing

Conclusion

Get an Expert

Possible Methods of Testing in Production

Conclusion

Reusable and Editable Testing Suites

Track each Code Modification

Early on Functional Testing

Critical to Integrate Testing with Other Tools

Align Quality Goals with QA Strategy

Determine Quality using the Best Standards of Measurement

In Conclusion

Recent Posts

Amazing clients who
trust us