Test automation management tools
 | This article may require copy editing for grammar, style, cohesion, tone, or spelling. (March 2013) |
 | This article needs additional citations for verification. (February 2011) |
Test automation management tools are specific tools that provide a collaborative environment that is intended to make test automation efficient, traceable and clear for stakeholders. Test automation is becoming a cross-discipline (i.e. a mix of both testing and development practices,) therefore, the need for a specific and dedicated test automation environment is becoming vital.
Motivation
Test automation usually lacks reporting, analysis and meaningful information about a project's status. Test management systems target manual effort and does not give all the required information.[1] Test automation management system leverages automation effort towards efficient and continuous processes of delivering test execution and new working tests by:
- Making transparent, meaningful and traceable reporting for all project stakeholders.
- Easing test debugging through built-in test results analysis workflow.
- Providing valuable metrics and KPIs – both technical and business-wise (trend analysis, benchmarking, gap analysis, root cause analysis, risk point analysis).
- Grid benchmarking and comparison of test execution days reduces analysis and review effort.
- Clean traceability with other testing artifacts (test cases, data, issues, etc.).
- Keeping historical data in a single place.
- Post project analysis and automation performance assessment. (Progress of test coverage shows the group performance.)
Compliance with Agile
Test automation management tools are perfectly fit Agile methodologies and SDLC. In most cases, test automation covers continuous changes in order to minimize manual regression testing, therefore, at glance reporting is essential in order to be up to date and move the project quickly. The changes are usually noted by seeing differences of errors in test logs between day A and day A+1. For example, difference in number of failures (logs errors) signal about probable changes either in AUT or in test code (broken test code base, instabilities) or rarely in both. Quick notice of changes and unified workflow of results analysis ultimately reduces cost of testing overall and increases project quality attributes.
TDD
Test-driven development utilizes test automation as the primary driver to rapid and high-quality software production. Concepts of green line and thoughtful design are supported with tests before actual coding, assuming there are special tools to track and analyze within TDD process.
Continuous Integration
Another proper test automation practice [2] is being part of continuous integration which explicitly supposes to have automated test suites as a final stage upon building, deployment and distributing new versions of software. Based on acceptance of test results, a build is declared either as qualified for further testing or not qualified (rejected).[3] CI web dashboards provide relevant information on all stages of software building including automation test results. However, CI dashboards do not support comprehensive operations and views for an automation engineer. This is another reason for having dedicated management tools which can supply high-level data to other project management tools such as CI, test management tools, issue management, change management.
References
- ^ Kartashov, Peter (2011). = Test Automation Management: A Call For Better Tools. Automated Software Testing Magazine.
- ^ Kolawa, Adam (2007). Automated Defect Prevention: Best Practices in Software Management. Wiley-IEEE Computer Society Press. ISBN 0-470-04212-5.
{{cite book}}: Unknown parameter|coauthors=ignored (|author=suggested) (help) - ^ Fowler, Martin. "Continuous Integration". Retrieved 2009-11-11.