How To Develop And Implement Test Automation

how to develop implement test automation

Test automation offers multiple benefits to an organisation and its QA team. However, to make test automation a success, there are certain things that need to be defined, and this article looks into them. Automation testing has revolutionized the approach that QA  teams have towards  software testing. 

While the benefits of automation testing services are many, the initial investment required for setting up the environment for automation testing, is what some organisations consider to be the biggest hurdle in the journey towards implementing automation testing. However, what the organisations fail to realize is the fact that in the long run, benefits offered by automation surpass the costs involved. In other words, it is the fast and high ROI that forms the biggest USP of automation. Interestingly enough, there are quite a few automated software testing tools available in the market today. 

These test automation tools like QARA Enterprise, Ranorex, and Eggplant, offer QA teams the features they need in order to implement automation  successfully today in their projects. Now the question that arises is, how easy it is to implement test automation for great results? In this article, there is a list of pointers that need to be defined in order to ensure maximum success with the use of automated testing tools. 

1] The tools to be used The most important requirement for successful implementation of automation in an organisation is a good automated software testing tool. Now different tools come with different features, so which one a QA team chooses to use, depends on the project requirements. For example, if a team of manual testers is planning to switch to automation, zero coding tool is a good choice. Finding a program that utilizes AI in software testing is also very helpful.

2] The framework to work with Test automation framework is a set of rules that define the approach towards testing. Choosing the right framework is as important as choosing the right automated software testing tool. Depending on the requirements of the project, the QA team can choose to go with keyboard driven framework or data-driven framework, or both. It depends on the goals to be achieved in the testing project.

3] Defining the goal Now this one is really important to make the QA project a success. After all, every project needs a goal. Without a goal, the project is directionless and is likely to never succeed. To define the goal, the QA team need to draft a Product Roadmap that makes it clear what the team needs to achieve, and eliminates any confusion whatsoever. 

4] The process or approach Once the automated software testing tool, the framework and the product roadmap is in place, the next step is to decide on a process or approach in a way that ensures success and minimises the chances of failure. The test process should be defined while considering factors like costing, expertise of the team members, the list involved and training required. 

5] Estimation of manual testing if required It is common knowledge that irrespective of the project a team is working on, project can be completely automated. There is a part of the project that requires manual efforts. Before implementing automation with an automated software testing tool, it is important to have an idea about how much of the project would depend on the availability of resources for manual testing. This will help the team understand how much of the project is to be automated, and how much time it would take to complete the entire project, considering the fact that a certain portion of it would require manual intervention. 

Conclusion: While defining the parameters above can take some brainstorming as well as a significant amount of time, at the end of the day it will be worth it all. Hence, organisations should make it a point to have this information in place before going ahead investing in an automated software testing tool and getting started with implementation of automation.

Test Automation Frameworks have significant importance in the success or failure of applications. They help in reducing the maintenance costs and efforts put by the testing teams. In addition to these, a powerful test automation framework benefits in many ways such as increased Return on Investment (ROI), delivers the software at the right period, saves cost, etc. Hence, while building the test automation framework it is important for enterprises to follow the best practices. 

Today’s digital era demands enterprises for delivering products faster to compete with changing market and customer requirements. To make the products delivered with quality-assured software testing has become a major requirement. But to ensure that the software testing is practiced with the right automation architecture, it becomes important to have a powerful test automation framework. Test automation frameworks help in maintaining test cases, organize the reports, increase the speed, quality, accuracy in test cases, etc. Evidently, to leverage all these benefits, it is essential to develop a test automation framework with the best practices. What is the Test Automation Framework? Test Automation Framework consists of a set of guidelines to provide an execution environment to automate test scripts. 

The frameworks comprise of testing practices and testing tools to enhance the process of automation testing. There are a number of benefits achieved with frameworks such as: Assures in enhancing the testing practice Minimizes the maintenance costs Improves test coverage Increases ROI Limits manual intervention Ensures code reusability What are the types of Automation Testing Frameworks? There are six automation testing frameworks that are widely preferred by teams. While building the testing framework, it is a crucial step to choose the right framework for the application. Hybrid Testing Framework Linear Automation Framework Modular-based Testing Framework Keyword-driven Framework Library Architecture Testing Framework Data-Driven Framework How to develop a powerful Test Automation Framework? 

In order to develop a powerful test automation framework for developing an application, it is very crucial to follow the best practices such as: Need to create wrapper methods for libraries: This way of extending the library features helps in enabling better logging capabilities and handling errors. Need for implementing a custom logger: To run a test case, it is essential that the activity information is logged into the file. This helps to run the test cases and future audits. Need to choose the right designing pattern: It is essential to choose the best design pattern to achieve benefits such as speeding up test case development, preventing minor issues to turn bigger, improving code readability, etc. 

Need for Separating tests from the Automation framework: It is good to separate the test script logic from the automation framework because this helps in improving the code readability Need to create a proper folder structure for code: The naming or the definition of folder structure should be code readable and understandable. Need to separate Web services, UI, Databases: Separation of concerns is a crucial principle in frameworks. Hence, an additional layer is essential for API, databases, UI, and web services to avoid clutters. Need to develop continuous development: Continuous testing has to be integrated with the help of automation tools, for example, Maven helps to ensure that the test automation software is free from the break after every commit. 

Conclusion: Test Automation Framework is one of the most important components in the software testing life cycle (STLC). It is the factor that can give success or failure in app development. Hence, it's essential to develop an effective test automation framework for a successful SDLC. The above-mentioned are the steps helping to develop a test automation framework. Leverage software testing services from an independent QA services provider to achieve the complete benefits with test automation frameworks.

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