Software Testing
Software testing can be stated as the process of verifying and validating that a software or application is bug free, meets the technical requirements as guided by it’s design and development and meets the user requirements effectively and efficiently with handling all the exceptional and boundary cases.
.Software testing also helps to identify errors, gaps or missing requirements in contrary to the actual requirements. It can be either done manually or using automated tools. In simple terms, Software Testing means Verification of Application Under Test (AUT).
Steps of Software Testing
The Software Testing Life Cycle (STLC) includes a number of steps that have been completed in sequence. Even though some of these steps can vary, in general the main sequence of steps are the following.
- Requirement Analysis − When the SRD is ready and shared with the stakeholders, the testing team starts high level analysis concerning the AUT (Application under Test).
- Test Planning − Test Team plans the strategy and approach.
- Test Case Designing − Develop the test cases based on scope and criteria’s.
- Test Environment Setup − When integrated environment is ready to validate the product.
- Test Execution − Real-time validation of product and finding bugs.
- Test Closure − Once testing is completed, matrix, reports, results are documented.
Different types of software testing
- Manual Testing : Manual testing is testing of the software where tests are executed manually by a QA Analysts. It is performed to discover bugs in software under development. In Manual testing, the tester checks all the essential features of the given application or software. In this process, the software testers execute the test cases and generate the test reports without the help of any automation software testing tools. It is a classical method of all testing types and helps find bugs in software systems. It is generally conducted by an experienced tester to accomplish the software testing process.
- Automation Testing : In Automated Software Testing, testers write code/test scripts to automate test execution. Testers use appropriate automation tools to develop the test scripts and validate the software. The goal is to complete test execution in a less amount of time. Automated testing entirely relies on the pre-scripted test which runs automatically to compare actual result with the expected results. This helps the tester to determine whether or not an application performs as expected. Automated testing allows you to execute repetitive task and regression test without the intervention of manual tester. Even though all processes are performed automatically, automation requires some manual effort to create initial testing scripts.
Why is Software Testing Important?
- To know how comfortable the software is.
- To avoid additional expenses.
- To know if the product has hidden features.
- To determine software performance.
- To verify all aspects of the software.
- To determine the quality of the software.
- Not to lose the confidence of the customer.
- To satisfy the customer.
