#software application testing

The fact that today’s world is driven digitally is underpinned on the functioning of the software and hardware architecture. To ensure every piece of software performs to its optimum capacity and meets its objectives, strict implementation of software testing and QA is required. However, enterprises have been found to give short shrift to software application testing to enable faster time-to-market and reduce cost. That this approach is inherently faulty and delivers poor customer experiences seems to be lost on many key stakeholders. Before getting into what the absence of software testing and QA can lead to, let us understand what software quality assurance testing is all about.

What is software quality assurance testing?

It is testing various aspects of the software code to check if they are performing to their optimal level and delivering the expected results. It ensures the software is stable, reliable, responsive, high performing, secure, and delivering the best user experience. So, the benefits of conducting software application testing are

·       Ensuring the software remains bug-free and qualitatively superior

·       Enhancing the customer experience

·       Streamlining the value chain

·       Ensuring continuous improvement to the software

·       The product reaching the market fast and at optimum cost

·       Boosting customer satisfaction, productivity, and efficiency

·       Enterprises staying competitive and improving their bottom lines

Types of software quality assurance services

Overall, the testing can be classified into two types - functional and non-functional testing

Functional testing: This type of testing checks the functional requirements of an application and focuses on the expected outcomes. Here, the internal parts of the software are ignored. The examples are

·       Unit testing

·       Integration testing

·       Sanity testing

·       System testing

·       Regression testing

·       Smoke testing

·       Interface testing

·       Beta or acceptance testing

Non-functional testing: In this type of software testing and QA, the readiness, response time and attributes like throughput are tested to check if they are quick enough to meet the business requirements. The examples are

·       Performance testing

·       Stress testing

·       Load testing

·       Localization testing

·       Volume testing

·       Security testing

·       Compatibility testing

·       Recovery testing

·       Install testing

·       Reliability testing

·       Usability testing

·       Compliance testing

Why is software testing important?

The software development process can allow bugs or glitches to become part of the code even with the best of measures and intentions. It is therefore important that the same should be tested rigorously in all aspects before being released to the end-customer. The process of development and testing has evolved right from the waterfall method to Agile and DevOps. In the waterfall method, software used to be tested manually only after they were developed and integrated. This approach had a lot of issues like being extremely time-consuming and generating poor-quality output. The manual way of implementing a software quality assurance strategy is not foolproof, especially while conducting regression testing. Manual testing can lead to fatigue and the possibility of errors being overlooked. Thus, even after the waterfall method of testing, a lot of glitches remained within the software causing quality issues.

To overcome the inadequacies of the waterfall method, Agile and DevOps were instituted where testing is made part of the build pipeline. A code after being built is directly tested for errors and fixed in a process called a sprint. Also, test automation is made part of the testing process wherein repetitive testing like regression is done with a better success rate. With DevOps, the testing process has been made almost perfect with all stakeholders (Development and Operations) made part of the value chain.

Thus, software testing identifies and fixes errors in the early part of the development process. The final product becomes qualitatively superior and delivers better customer experiences. Also, it lowers the maintenance cost and prevents customers from suffering consequences on account of hidden bugs.

5 reasons for not skipping software testing and QA

Software quality assurance testing is an important part of the software development process and should not be looked as a costly or time-consuming proposition. It has become essential in today’s milieu where staying competitive can only be ensured by delivering customer delight. The top 5 consequences of skipping testing are:

1.     Breach in information security: The security of data is of prime importance given the soaring rate of cybercrime. In the absence of security testing, the inherent vulnerabilities in the software remain unidentified. These can be easily exploited by hackers leading to a data breach. So, any software quality assurance company should verify if the communication channels and databases within the software or outside are properly encrypted. If not, the customers can end up losing sensitive personal and/or financial information to hackers.

2.     Increased cost of maintenance: The resident glitches in software can cause quality issues at the level of customers. The feedback, when goes back to the production pipeline, would entail extra effort and cost to first identify the glitches causing the quality issues and then fix them.

3.     Loss of customer confidence: This is arguably the biggest consequence a brand or enterprise can suffer on account of bad software. As customers have plenty of choices before them, they will discard any software with glitches. Further, since the whole objective is about acquiring customer confidence, lack of testing can leave the software vulnerable and subject to breakdowns or plagued by performance issues.

4.     Non-compliance with industry regulations: The industry and regulatory bodies have established many protocols such as PCI DSS, HIPPA, SOX, and GLBA, which need to be complied with. These protocols ensure the software upholds a minimum level of performance and quality. If not, the enterprises delivering such software can fall foul with such agencies and invite penalties, censure, lawsuits, or an outright ban.

5.     Loss of brand value: When customers lose confidence in a software product due to frequent quality issues, they reject the application. Then it becomes a challenge for the enterprise to earn their confidence back, which is time and cost-intensive.

Conclusion

Software products have become an integral part of driving the whole global digital ecosystem. They bring with them attributes like convenience, speed of operations, security, and privacy, among others. As customers became choosy with their preferences and the competition among providers got intense, quality became the core differentiator that helped an organization stay ahead of the competition. To ensure the delivery of superior-quality products from the build pipeline and pre-empt customers from facing any issues with their performance, the former should be subjected to rigorous software product testing. Over a period, quality assurance has come to be associated with standard processes, practices, and methodologies. These should be followed in letter and spirit to enhance quality, streamline workflows, improve efficiency, and be responsive to customer feedback. However, a few QA practices have become dated and should be updated with the new trends. To understand these better, let us discuss some dos and don’ts about software application testing.

The do’s of software product testing

Quality Assurance (QA) is a critical requirement in the product development lifecycle to identify and remove glitches. It helps to make a product competitive and allow it to meet the customer’s expectations. If QA is not part of the SDLC, the consequences for the entire value chain can be severe.

·       The product would be left with glitches thereby impacting its performance.

·       Hackers can exploit the inherent vulnerabilities to steal sensitive business and customer information.

·       Security protocols can go for a toss with the business inviting censure and penalties from regulators.

·       The brand suffers immensely as adverse publicity through word of mouth can go viral.

ü  Choose specific test cases for automation: Automation is the key when it comes to performing repetitive tests such as regression. However, care should be taken to choose the right test cases for automation as test complexities can render such testing infructuous. To automate everything is certainly not the way to go about in a software product testing strategy. There should be a proper selection criterion in place to choose a test case for automation. If done the right way, test automation can deliver benefits that far outweigh the costs.

ü  Upgrade skills for automation: Even though automation is a potent software product testing method, the skills required to execute the same is not always available. For any team going for test automation as part of the software product testing strategy, the QA team should be well-versed with any one of the programming languages such as Ruby, C#, JavaScript, or Python. Besides, the team members should have the expertise of handling automation test tools like Selenium. The bottom line is that more the testers have skills for automation, better will be the outcome of software product testing.

ü  Quicken the pace of testing: In a non-Agile test environment, testers are wont to leave some of their difficult tests at the end of the SDLC. However, this practice is flawed as testing the quality of applications at the end of the development process hinders delivery. Rather, the testing team should adopt a risk-based approach towards software product testing and execute the high priority cases first.

ü  Manage the testing environment: Testers seeking deployment no longer holds, for today, it is more about managing the test environment by configuring the CI tool or Selenium grid. There should be cloud, containers, and virtualization, and the ability to write appropriate test scripts.

ü  Shorter tests: The test suites should be made shorter to enable better and quicker detection of glitches. Not everything should be tested in a test scenario, for it would make troubleshooting difficult later.

ü  Follow shift-left: The QA team should align itself with the development team through shift-left testing. This way, they can make a better impact on the quality of software and deliver it faster through the value chain. Also, shift-left helps developers to quickly mitigate any glitches in the code and move to the next sprint.

The don’ts of software product testing

In addition to the above-mentioned ‘dos,’ testers should follow some don’ts as well to enhance the quality of testing and not leaving anything to chance.

·       Tracking defects in many places: Keep a single log of defective cases or glitches instead of documenting them in various places – excel sheets, tracking tools. A centralized repository for documenting glitches can help in their quicker tracking and better monitoring.

·       Focus on negative scenarios: Testers should not spend their energies on testing negative test scenarios that are less likely to be used by the end customers. Even though these should be tested during the test cycle, the priority should be set for scenarios that are most likely to be used by the end customers.

·       Avoid regression testing: Any change made to the application can impact specific areas of it unless regression testing is carried out. Often testers are of the view that regression testing can be avoided as the features or functionalities to be tested had been done earlier. However, any assumption in this regard can be fraught with danger as the changes can cause defects in other areas of the application.

·       Automate everything: This follows from the ‘dos’ mentioned above where only specific test cases should be automated. The testing team should leave some space for manual testing as automation does not lend itself to every possible scenario. For example, any wrong code in the test script can harm the testing exercise.

Conclusion

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