Automated Testing: How not to Make Worse
It is well-known that the automation principle is widely used during software testing of various products. It is considered as one of the testing tools that increases the effectiveness of the checking procedure.
But, unfortunately, some QA engineers are not fully aware of what tests should be automated and what tests it is better to perform manually. In some cases, applying the automation principle, the team will only cause the appearance of more bugs.
As any other principle or methodology, automated testing has its own pros and cons. To avoid the difficulties connected with the automation, a tester should analyze and review several aspects of test cases.
What Are the Preconditions of Effective Automation?
- To define what tests should be automated (usually, the test cases for functional testing, regression testing, load checking are automated).
- To make sure that the automation principle is not applied for usability, exploratory, acceptance tests.
- To estimate the auto tests coverage and available resources.
- To review the available tools, the team’s skills and abilities, working experience, the system capabilities and specifics, the peculiarities of test environment, etc.
- To estimate the time and expenses needed for the automation.
Besides that, the auto tests should be maintained manually, and it is rather time-consuming process. A tester should analyze all pluses and minuses of this procedure to define whether the automation will be still efficient and productive.
If the automation principle is applied in a proper way, then the product will be economically viable and it will reach success on the software market.
Source: QATestLab
