What is software testing? What are the stages of testing process? Read to find out about its planning, designing and the implementation stages.
Software development is an intricate process that requires qualified professionals and a dedicated team. But despite everything, it is not uncommon for bugs and errors to creep in. These put both the users and entrepreneurs at risk and can prove fatal for the future of your brand.
That is why it is essential to test your software products before rolling them out in the market and engaging in mass production. Testing assures products that are free from defects or errors and meet your requirements.
What is software testing?
Software testing includes checking software products for bugs, errors, or adaptability in different environments.
As evident from the name, automated testing uses software strategies, tools, and AI for the testing process. Whereas in manual and software testing, the testers look for bugs or errors at different levels.
But that is not all. You should also be familiar with software testing to make the right choice.
Depending on the demands of your enterprise, you can also go for black box testing without accessing the code or white box testing, where the testers access the source code and then test your software for bugs or errors.
Benefits of automatic testing
Although both manual and automatic testing have their own pros and cons, in an era ruled by competition and high demand, automated quality assurance services are the need of the hour. It gets an edge over manual testing because of the benefits discussed below:
Cost-effective
Automatic testing is a cost-saving alternative. Running repetitive tests in manual testing takes more time and can become an issue as the cost rises. But you can reuse the automatic tests without any additional cost. Although building these may take some time, this saves time and cost in the long run.
Faster Development
Software is always faster than humans. That is why automated testing speeds up the time to market by cutting down the development time. Automatic tests run simultaneously and faster, making frequent updates and releases easy.
More Efficient
It is human to err. But the software is not prone to mistakes, making automatic testing more reliable as you can focus on all the aspects and nothing remains untouched. With automated testing, your team does not have to look at all the tests and results; it can track bugs, continuous testing, and reporting.
Brand Enhancement
Your brand value in the market depends on the quality of your products. Perfect products foster trust in your brand. Moreover re-using automatic tests also saves time and costs so you can keep all the data up-to-date. You will always be able to cater flawless data and products to the users at every stage.
Manual VS Automatic Testing
Six steps in software testing
Hiring the right quality assurance services can go a long way. So go for the best quality analysts to test your software and follow the right strategies and steps. Ideally, a software test consists of six steps. Carefully completing each phase is necessary for a perfect software product, at par with your requirements and market needs.
- Requirement analysis
Before testing starts, look at the product to know the requirements. If you hire quality analysts, ensure that you understand the product and can communicate them to the testers. This helps them identify the goals and pick up the best testing strategy.
- Planning the test
Once everyone understands the requirements, the next step is to set the goals and decide the method to follow. It includes laying down the plan of action and setting a timeline to achieve this. You also need to take care of the clients, your team, and the market conditions while planning the test, making it practical and attainable.
- Designing the test
Now that you have the skeleton of your plan test ready, the next step is to start working on the test. In automatic testing, the analysts write the rules at this step. Whereas in manual testing, the quality assurance service providers develop the test.
- Setting up the environment
When you run the test, it should mimic the conditions in which the final product will operate. It includes the software configurations and the rules to check the adaptability for greater precision.
- Running the test
It is the step when the testing process starts. This step does need manual interference in automatic testing, it just needs the command, and the software will take over. However, in manual testing, this is where the testers get to work and start looking for major flaws.
- Reporting
Simply running the test does not conclude the testing process. Also, carefully document all the errors and submit a report to resolve them. You might also want to re-check the things after the improvisations so that you do not miss out on anything.
Concluding Words
Software testing has rightfully become the key to quality products. Therefore before you start, it is important to familiarise yourself with the basic strategies and steps. It is essential to understand the requirements, plan and design the test before running it and then ensure proper documentation to alleviate the bottlenecks. Don’t forget to involve everyone, including your team, clients, and end users for the best results like brand enhancement, cost savings, and faster time to market!
