Software testing is a process to classify the accuracy, completeness, and quality of developed computer software that involves a set of activities carried to find errors in software so that they could be fixed before the final product is out for the end-users. Putting it in simple terms, software testing is the activity to monitor and ensure that the software is error-free and performs the way it is supposed to perform. The software testing industry includes two different kinds of testing - Manual and Automation testing. There is a clear difference between these two testing types. The primary one is that manual testing requires time and physical effort to ensure the software code does its job. In this article, we are going to focus more on Automated Testing and how it works.
What is Automated Testing?
Automated testing also referred to as test automation, is a process in software testing that uses software tools to manage the execution of tests and then analyses test results with expected results. It is done automatically with limited or no interruption from the testing engineer. Automation adds further testing processes to the mix that may be too difficult to execute manually.
Automation testing means using an automation tool to perform your test case sets. On the other hand, Manual testing is performed by human involvement in front of a machine, manually executing all the test steps. The automation software can also be used to input test data into the System under Test, compare expected and original results and generate complete test reports. Test Automation requires a substantial amount of investments of money and resources. Because automated testing is done with the help of an automation tool, it takes less time in exploratory testing and more in managing test scripts while increasing overall test coverage. The upside of manual testing is that it lets the human brain to draw insights from software testing that might otherwise be missed by automation testing tools. However, Automated testing is for large projects that need repeated testing in the same areas and the projects that have already gone through an initial manual testing process.
Why Automation Testing?
Automated testing has many benefits for app testing life cycles. It allows you to build more productive apps with less effort and in less time. But companies are still running manual tests as they are not aware of the process to properly integrate automated testing in their software development.
If any software comes up with new releases and bug fixes, then how will one assure that the newly released software with bug fixes has not added any new bug in the earlier version? Testing the software with old features is one way to do it. It's not easy to test all features of the software manually every time with added bug fixes or new features. So it becomes convenient to test software repeatedly by Automation testing method using Automation testing tool efficiently in terms of cost, resources and time.
Some of the reasons why Automation Testing is beneficial:
Running testing process 24/7: You can conduct the testing process irrespective of where you are and what time it is. It gets even easier to conduct that from a remote location when you don’t have the required devices or resources to buy them.
Fewer Human Resources: A test automation engineer can write the scripts to automate your tests, instead of a lot of people manually carrying out tedious software testing life cycles over and over again.
Bugs: Automated testing helps rectify bugs and glitches in the software at the early stages of software development. Hence, reducing your expenses and working hours of your software development team.
Eliminates partial/cumulative testing: Automated tests enable you to run tests as regularly as you want to ensure larger coverage. It might not be achievable through manual testing as a lot of manual testers have to be put to work constantly. Increased coverage means you can test out more features and ultimately release a higher grade software.
Re-usability: Automated test cases are reusable, that means they can be used through different methods, so you don’t need new test scripts every time. Additionally, it makes the configuration or setup easier and allows developers to perform load testing, fix recognised bugs, assess program feedback, and ensure the quality of the software.
How does Automation Testing work?
A company executes test automation with a testing framework that covers common practices, testing tools and standards. Data-driven and keyword-driven test automation frameworks come standard practice and so do frameworks for linear scripting and modular testing. The linear scripting framework is ideal for small applications because it lets you use test scripts with minimal planning, but fail to support reusable scripts.
While in modular testing frameworks, a software tester creates scripts in the form of small, independent tests to decrease repetition, but this method is time-consuming to set up.
Success in test automation requires thorough planning and plan work. These are the following steps are followed in an automated testing process:
You may also read: 7 Frameworks for Automated PHP Testing
- Selecting a test tool
Before implementing test automation, you should establish the goal of automation. Once you have made up your mind about what kind of tests you are performing, you need to pick the right software testing tool. There are a lot of good options out there when it comes to testing tools, like Selenium, TestComplete, UFT One etc.
so consider a few points while selecting the perfect tool:
- How easy it is to develop and maintain the scripts for the tool?
- Does the tool come with test reporting features?
- Will it also work on platforms like web, mobile, desktop?
- How many testing types and languages does this tool support?
- Defining the scope of automation
Next thing you need to do is define the scope of automation and choose the test cases to automate based on the following:
- Technical feasibility
- How complex the test cases are
- Situations that deals with a large amount of data
- Test cases which have similar features across applications
- Planning, Designing, and Developing
After defining your goal and types of tests you want to automate, you will have to decide the actions you want your automated tests to perform. Planning, designing, and developing include:
- Developing Test Cases: Large, complicated automated tests are usually difficult to compile and debug. The easier route is to divide your test into numerous simple, consistent and shorter tests.
- Developing Test Suites: Test suites are a set of test cases to make sure that the automated test cases run smoothly without any manual interference. Creating a test suite with multiple test cases, a library and command-line tool that executes the test suite will do the job.
- Test Execution
Automation Scripts are run during the test execution phase. This execution is done using the automation tool or through the test management tool that will invoke the automation tool.
- Maintenance
After executing the test cases, the next move is to create reports so that the operations performed during testing are registered. With new features added to the software that you are testing with progressive testing cycles, automation scripts also need to be added, analysed and maintained for each release cycle. Thus, Maintenance plays a vital role in improving the effectiveness of automation.
Conclusion
Automated testing does come with its own set of benefits but keep that in mind that it is not a one size fits all solution for all your software testing requirements. There are plenty of automation testing companies in India who can make sure that you have the appropriate automation testing tool with the features to your software or business requirements. Establishing a successful automated testing approach is not easy, and the procedure varies from team to team. One team may include more manual testers than automation engineers, while the other can heavily depend on developers to do the heavy lifting. Budget, deadlines, software type, and development model are all factors that impact the implementation of an automated testing approach.
One of the services that we provide at Evon Technologies is independent software testing which includes Automated testing, Manual testing, Load and performance testing and Security testing. In our automated testing kit, we provide GUI Test Automation with reusable frameworks, Data-Driven test automation, Keyword-driven test automation, etc. to get you started. Need further assistance? Reach us here or Email us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and share your requirements with us.
