Automated software testing is a technique that employs automation to validate software functionality and compliance with requirements before its release. This approach speeds up specific tests and eliminates the need for human testers. It's particularly beneficial in the software testing landscape due to its efficiency, cost-effectiveness, time-saving attributes, and fast execution of test scripts.

The primary objectives of automated testing are multifaceted - we can include many automated testing best practices in this list.

• High-Quality Software and User Satisfaction: The central purpose of software testing is to release software without critical bugs, thereby ensuring user satisfaction. Automation testing contributes significantly to this goal with its diverse methods and tools.

• Reduced Testing Time and Effort: Automation is ideal where manual testing is time-consuming. It shortens the time required for running tests and is particularly effective in testing complex applications with numerous features.

• Improving Productivity and Quality While Cutting Expenses: Automated testing benefits long-term projects. It allows for test execution during off-peak hours on multiple servers and in various scenarios, making it more efficient and cost-effective than manual testing.

• Software Quality Improvement with Each Revision Phase: Automated testing is crucial in bug avoidance and localization between software iterations, enhancing software quality with each phase.

• Increased Security and Reliability: Automation testing helps understand an application's response under extreme conditions, thus contributing to the software's stability and security.

• Better Comprehension of the System Under Test: Automated testing facilitates the exploration of various scenarios, enhancing the understanding of the system's behavior.

In the context of the shift towards DevOps test automation, automation testing aligns well with the rapid pace of modern software development, necessitating continuous innovation from software testing engineers. This approach is increasingly recognized for its best practices and effectiveness in enhancing businesses' competitive edge in the software market.

Why Using Automation to Test Is Vital

The significance of using automation in software testing lies in its numerous advantages. Here's why automation in testing is vital:

• Enhanced Efficiency and Speed: Automated tests execute much faster than manual tests. This speed is crucial in agile development environments, where quick feedback on new features is needed. Automation helps achieve continuous delivery and integration by allowing more tests to be performed in less time.

• Consistency and Accuracy: Automated testing provides consistent results as it eliminates the variability introduced by human testers. It performs the same steps precisely every time it runs, ensuring consistent and accurate test results. This reliability is critical in verifying the software functions correctly after changes or updates.

• Wider Test Coverage: Automated testing enables the execution of many impractical tests with manual testing. This extensive coverage ensures that various aspects of the software are thoroughly tested, including complex scenarios and edge cases. It allows QA teams to test more application parts, improving software quality.

• Reusability of Test Scripts: Automated test scripts can be reused with little or no modification across different versions of an application. This reusability saves time and effort in the long run, as the same scripts can be employed to test different aspects of the software across multiple development cycles.

• Early Bug Detection: Automation helps identify defects early in the development cycle. Early bug detection saves costs and reduces the time to market. Fixing bugs found before is easier and less expensive than fixing those discovered after the software is deployed.

• Facilitates Continuous Testing: Automated testing is essential in continuous integration/deployment (CI/CD) environments. It allows teams to frequently integrate and test changes, leading to higher quality and more stable software releases.

How Real Devices Benefit Automation Testing

Incorporating real devices into automation testing offers substantial benefits, significantly enhancing the quality and effectiveness of the testing process. Here's why using real devices is beneficial for automation testing:

• Accurate Real-World Performance Testing: Testing on real devices provides the most accurate insights into how the software will perform in the real world. It allows testers to accurately represent the application's behavior under various real-world conditions, including network environments, battery levels, and hardware performance variations.

•** Diverse Device and OS Compatibility Testing**: The vast array of available mobile devices, each with different screen sizes, resolutions, and operating systems, makes testing on real devices crucial. This diversity ensures that the mobile app works seamlessly.

• Detection of Device-Specific Issues: Some bugs and performance issues only manifest on specific devices or under certain conditions that cannot be replicated in simulated environments. Testing on real devices helps identify and resolve these device-specific issues before releasing the software.

• User Experience Evaluation: Real device testing provides insights into the user experience, including touchscreen responsiveness, app loading times, camera functionality, and other hardware-dependent features. This evaluation is critical in ensuring that the final product meets user expectations.

• Network Variability Testing: Real devices allow testing in different network conditions (like 3G, 4G, Wi-Fi, etc.), providing insights into how network variability impacts the app's performance. This aspect is crucial for applications that heavily rely on network connectivity.

• Sensor-Based Feature Testing: Modern devices have various sensors like GPS, gyroscopes, accelerometers, and more. Testing on real devices helps assess how well the application interacts with these hardware features, which is often challenging to simulate accurately in virtual environments.

Integrating real devices into automation testing ensures a complete evaluation of the software in performance, compatibility, user experience, and functionality. It addresses the limitations of simulated testing environments, providing a more accurate and reliable assessment performance for actual users.

Conclusion

Automated software testing is a cornerstone in modern software development, playing a pivotal role in ensuring the release of high-quality, robust, and user-friendly applications. Integrating automation into testing processes accelerates the pace of development and brings forth a level of precision and efficiency that manual testing alone cannot achieve. From enhancing test coverage and accuracy to optimizing resource utilization and supporting agile and DevOps methodologies, the benefits of automated testing are manifold.

Organizations using automation testing tools without coding can leverage tools like HeadSpin. HeadSpin allows users to perform codeless test automation by giving them access to AI that runs effective tests and provides comprehensive results.

Originally Published:- https://speakerdeck.com/hughgrant/guide-to-automated-software-testing