An Overview of UiPath FORWORD VI

The FORWARD VI conference is an exciting platform where industry pioneers meet to discuss the concepts and tactics influencing the direction of automation. It is an opportunity for the business executives to learn about the UiPath vision for the future of AI and how automation powered by AI is transforming industries.

The conference promises to offer deep insights into the latest trends, cutting-edge technologies, and real-world applications of RPA. Attendees get the opportunity to engage with visionary speakers, participate in interactive sessions, witness live demonstrations, and connect with like-minded professionals, all contributing to a vibrant atmosphere of learning and growth. It’s a gathering of automation aficionados, a celebration of innovation that shares UiPath’s commitment to driving the RPA revolution forward.

UiPath Test Suite and its significance in the world of RPA and test automation

UiPath Test Suite is a transformative tool in the sphere of Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and test automation. It represents a powerhouse of tools designed to elevate the testing process within the RPA landscape. This suite offers a unified platform for orchestrating, managing, and executing end-to-end testing seamlessly integrated with RPA workflows.

Its significance lies in its ability to deliver comprehensive testing capabilities, ensuring RPA solutions operate flawlessly across diverse scenarios. From functional validation to regression testing, UiPath Test Suite empowers developers and testers to scrutinize every facet of automation, driving efficiency, reliability, and precision. By promoting reusability and collaboration while providing robust reporting and analytics, it not only optimizes the testing workflow but also paves the way for a new era of accelerated, high-quality RPA implementations. UiPath Test Suite speaks of UiPath’s commitment to excellence, assisting in a future where RPA operates at the pinnacle of efficiency and dependability.

RPA and its Importance in Modern Software Testing

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) stands at the forefront of a technological revolution, redefining how we approach modern software testing. Imagine software robots mimicking human actions to navigate applications, execute repetitive tasks, and validate functionalities seamlessly.

RPA has emerged as a revolutionary, allowing testing teams to automate monotonous, rule-based tasks, and significantly enhance efficiency, accuracy, and speed in the testing process. By automating routine tasks, testers can shift their focus to higher-value activities like crafting comprehensive test strategies, identifying critical issues, and ensuring a superior user experience. Thus, RPA’s importance in modern software testing cannot be overstated—it’s the catalyst for a shift towards smarter, more efficient testing methodologies, ultimately delivering superior software products to users worldwide.

The Power of Integration: RPA and UiPath Test Suite

The integration of RPA and UiPath Test Suite represents a revolutionary leap in the world of test automation, elevating efficiency, precision, and scalability to unprecedented levels. When RPAs mimick human actions and automate repetitive tasks seamlessly merged with the rich testing capabilities of UiPath Test Suite, the result is dynamic. It can execute end-to-end testing with unmatched finesse. RPA, with its ability to replicate human interactions, ensures a true simulation of user behavior, while the comprehensive functionalities of UiPath Test Suite enable rigorous testing across diverse scenarios and platforms. This symbiosis allows for not only accelerated test case execution but also the validation of complex business processes, delivering a comprehensive and robust approach to software testing.

Furthermore, this integration optimizes the entire testing workflow by focusing on reusability and collaboration. Automation scripts and test cases created within UiPath Test Suite can be efficiently integrated into RPA workflows, saving time and effort by avoiding redundant work. The collaborative environment ensures seamless communication and coordination between development and testing teams, promoting an agile and iterative approach. Additionally, the consolidated reporting and analytics capabilities provide clear insights into testing results, enabling informed decision-making and continuous improvement. The amalgamation of RPA and UiPath Test Suite is the epitome of a synergy that not only amplifies the efficiency of test automation processes but also sets new standards for testing precision and excellence.

How UiPath’s features and capabilities are suitable for implementing RPA-based test automation

UiPath, as a leading RPA (Robotic Process Automation) platform, offers a robust set of features and capabilities that make it highly suitable for implementing RPA-based test automation. Here’s a detailed discussion on how UiPath’s offerings align with and enhance RPA in the context of test automation:

Intuitive Interface and Ease of Use: UiPath provides an intuitive and user-friendly interface, enabling testers and automation engineers to easily design, develop, and maintain automated test cases. Its low-code/no-code capabilities ensure that both technical and non-technical users can create automation scripts efficiently.

Advanced AI and ML Capabilities: UiPath incorporates AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) capabilities, which can be leveraged for smarter test automation. AI-powered features can assist in dynamic element identification, data validation, and predictive analysis, enhancing the overall test automation process.

Versatile Automation: UiPath is highly versatile and supports automation across a wide array of applications, technologies, and platforms. This flexibility is crucial in the context of test automation, where applications may use diverse technologies, and the automation tool needs to adapt accordingly.

Scalability and Performance: UiPath offers scalability, enabling the automation of a large number of test cases concurrently. This scalability is crucial for handling extensive test suites and ensuring timely execution of tests.

Robust Integration Capabilities: UiPath offers seamless integration with various testing tools, frameworks, and CI/CD (Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment) pipelines. This allows for a smooth integration of RPA-based test automation into the existing testing ecosystem, enhancing efficiency and collaboration.

TestingXperts: A Key Player in RPA-Based Test Automation

TestingXperts has been accorded the recognition of a “Leader” in NelsonHall’s NEAT Vendor Evaluation for Quality Engineering in 2023, specifically in the domain of RPA-based test automation. With a sharp focus on RPA-based test automation, TestingXperts empowers its clients to accelerate their time-to-market, significantly lower testing costs, and elevate software quality.

UiPath Test Suite combines leading RPA technology with state-of-the-art test automation capabilities to deliver:

• A single unified enterprise automation platform to achieve higher automation rates and faster time to market

• A test automation solution built on the familiar UiPath paradigm – Intelligent and comprehensive reporting and analytics

• A low-code test automation platform that does not require testers with deep coding skills

• A solution that leverages licensing investment across RPA and test

• The easy development of end-to-end tests across applications

• Ability to enable risk-based testing when combined with UiPath Process Mining

• Ability to develop and implement automation from a holistic perspective: Robotic Process Automation + Test Automation = Automation

• Significant artifact reuse – what is developed for testing can be reused for RPA thereby turning QA into a profit center

TestingXperts’ UiPath Test Suite Test Centre of Excellence (TCoE)

TestingXperts, Gold and USN certified partner of UiPath has developed Test Centre of Excellence in collaboration with UiPath. Our shared goal of improving test automation for a quicker time to market and more business value is the foundation of our endeavor. We’ve created assets and accelerators within the TCoE that strengthen UiPath Test Suite’s integration with our client’s environment. These accelerators are made to simplify the implementation procedure and guarantee a perfect fit with the client’s environment. For our clients, the CoE has been a pillar in allowing effective, dependable, and agile automation operations.

Our collaboration with UiPath has already yielded impressive results, showcasing the expertise of this cutting-edge technology. By leveraging UiPath’s RPA capabilities, TestingXperts has successfully enhanced automation initiatives for clients, resulting in up to 70% faster time-to-market and up to 96% reduced regression test coverage. The implementation of UiPath technology has propelled our clients towards a future where efficiency, accuracy, and innovation converge harmoniously.

How TestingXperts create a difference with its extensive UiPath capabilities?

Here are a few differentiators to set Tx apart:

• Early adopter and preeminent partner for Test Suite

• NextGen QA Company with statistical approach to AI/ RPAtesting

• DevOps ready framework using UiPath Test Suite to accelerate deployment

• Working closely with UiPath Test Suite team to create out of the box solutions for automation using UiPath

• 100+ trained/certified employees

What TestingXperts is Planning to Deliver at UiPath FORWARD VI?

As a proud participant, TestingXperts is primed to showcase its deep understanding and proficiency in leveraging UiPath’s transformative RPA solutions. Engage with our CEO, Manish Gupta, COO, Joe Underwood, as they share invaluable insights on how the amalgamation of AI and Automation can reshape businesses.

• Explore our enriching discussions, focusing on the latest trends, challenges, and opportunities in the RPA landscape.

• Witness firsthand how TestingXperts, in partnership with UiPath, is revolutionizing test automation through our Tx-UiPath Test Suite Center of Excellence (CoE).

• Discover the future of automation and how we can empower your organization to innovate and excel using the power of RPA and AI.

Don’t miss this exciting opportunity to connect, learn, and envision a future where automation is not just a tool, but a strategic imperative. TestingXperts is excitedly looking forward to meeting you there.

The post Explore the Capabilities of UiPath Test Suite at UiPath FORWARD VI first appeared on TestingXperts.

Content 1. 7 major Test Automation challenges testers face 2. How to overcome the above-stated test automation challenges? 3. What are some tester’s errors that cause test automation failures? 4. How can testers avoid the above-stated test automation errors? 5. Functional & Non-functional automation testing types for businesses to leverage 6. Major test automation tools to leverage 7. Conclusion 8. How can TestingXperts help to overcome your Test Automation Challenges?

Today’s businesses need high-quality software with faster time-to-market to beat the competition, which has increased the adoption of test automation. Businesses across industries leverage test automation, saving human effort and time by automating repetitive tasks and helps achieve test automation services for clients faster releases and quality software. However, testers make common mistakes while performing test automation, leading to its failure and significantly impacting business ROI. Therefore, it is essential to know the various common test automation challenges and how testers can overcome them in this blog.

An overview of test automation

Test automation is a technique of software testing wherein test automation frameworks and tools are used for executing the tests. Unlike manual testing, test automation does not require much human help as everything is performed automatically. The main aim of automation testing is to reduce the human effort consumed in performing mundane and repetitive tasks.

7 major Test Automation challenges testers face

1. Selecting the right test automation tool:

Various test automation tools exist, but deciding which tool is best for your business needs or project is always challenging. Therefore, identifying the right test automation tool is one of the biggest challenges testers face.

2. Identifying the right test automation strategy:

There is no one-size-fits-all approach for automation testing strategy as it differs from business to business. Therefore, testers face challenges in preparing the right test automation strategy.

3. Setting high expectations from test automation:

It is one of the common challenges as testers who have just started their journey tend to keep high expectations from test automation and altogether avoid manual testing.

4. Initial investment cost:

Test automation requires a high initial investment cost as purchasing tools, and building frameworks might involve some investment. While later, there will not be any further cost involved, and reusable test assets can be easily created and maintained.

5. Diverse testing environments:

Today, users access apps with OS and platform combinations from different devices. Testers must test applications on all these devices and OS, making test automation quite challenging.

6. False positives and false negatives:

One of the significant challenges that testers face with test automation is false positives and negatives, resulting in flaky tests.

7. Lack of team collaboration:

Another challenge that testers face during test automation is the lack of seamless team collaboration. This usually happens when developers and testers work separately on a project and might not have a proper communication channel.

8. Prioritizing Test Case:

With increasingly shorter release cycles, the limited time for product testing can cause an automated testing framework to become overloaded, leading to delays and missed timelines due to failing test cases. Therefore, prioritizing test cases, particularly in Regression Testing, is crucial for efficiency.

How to overcome the above-stated test automation challenges?

1. Leverage industry-leading test automation tools:

It is always advised to go for industry-leading tools as they are trusted and used by several leading companies to overcome the challenge of selecting the right automation testing tool. Moreover, these tools come with excellent community support.

2. Evaluate carefully test automation need:

Testers must first identify the need for test automation, followed by business needs, current IT infra, technology stack, tools requirement, etc. to overcome the challenge of determining the right test automation strategy, and they can brainstorm on framing an effective test automation strategy.

3. Leverage manual testing and test automation as per need:

It is always best to adopt a combination of manual and automated testing to overcome the challenge of setting high-expectation from test automation. Not all situations demand automation testing.

4. Invest progressively in automation tools/technology:

It is best to invest progressively and adopt automation tools/technology rather than investing all at once to overcome the challenge of high initial investment costs.

5. Leverage cloud-based testing platforms and simulators and emulators:

It is best advised to leverage cloud-based testing platforms and simulators and emulators rather than sourcing real devices to overcome the challenge of testing an app in a diverse environment.

6. Properly manage test scripts, test cases, and testing environments:

It is always suggested to properly manage test scripts, test cases, and testing environments to overcome the challenge of flaky tests caused due to false positives or false negatives.

7. Embrace DevOps:

It is advised to embrace and adopt DevOps processes that break the silos between developers and testers and ensure seamless collaboration to overcome the challenge of poor team collaboration.

8. Implementing Regression Testing :

Regression testing ensures that updates or changes to the application’s code don’t disrupt its functionality, maintaining stability and overall feature performance. However, the high volume of regression tests necessitates Test Case Prioritization (TCP) to complete testing within a shortened timeframe.

What are some tester’s errors that cause test automation failures?

1. Aiming for 100% automation:

One of the common mistakes that testers make during test automation is trying to automate almost everything possible. However, in reality, 100% automation of test cases is not possible as some test cases should be performed manually.

2. Automating large test cases in a single go:

Sometimes, testers try to automate large test cases in one attempt, leading to automation testing failure.

3. Testing multiple things in a single test case:

Another common mistake testers make is testing various items in a single test case. This makes test cases weak and leads to test automation failure.

4. Being rigid with testing order:

If the testers are not flexible with the testing order and try to follow the same testing order for every test case and project, it might not work well and lead to test automation failure.

5. Selecting the tool just because it is open-source:

Sometimes testers choose open-source tools because they are free. But it is not the right approach for tool selection, which might also lead to test automation failure.

6. Overlooking test case validation:

Testers often create automation scripts without validation checks, another reason for test automation failure.

7. Not maintaining the test automation suite:

As the software progresses, test cases become complex, and the test automation suite tends to grow. However, if a tester does not maintain or regularly update the test automation suite, it can lead to test automation failure.

How can testers avoid the above-stated test automation errors?

1. Adopt the right mix of manual and automation testing:

Testers should ensure the right combination of manual and automation testing and must not aim for 100% automation to reduce the chances of test automation failure.

2. Gradually increase test automation:

Testers should not automate significant test cases in a single go and must slowly increase the intensity of test automation to ensure successful test automation.

3. Slowly add new test cases to your test suite:

Testers must not test multiple things in a single test case; instead, they should add new test cases gradually to their test automation suite.

4. Ensure flexibility with test order:

Testing order does not matter during test automation; therefore, testers should ensure flexibility with the test order during automation.

5. Select a combination of open-source and commercial tools:

Open-source tools are good but commercial tools have their benefits. Therefore, testers should explore various tools and then pick the right combination of open-source and commercial tools for test automation.

6. Validate the test scripts:

Testers must validate test scripts to determine what is expected and what is achieved with automation testing. This process ensures the success of the automation testing process.

7. Regularly maintain the test automation suite:

Testers must regularly update and maintain a reliable test suite to ensure successful test automation.

Functional & Non-functional automation testing types for businesses to leverage

Functional Automation types:

• Functional testing:

It is performed to verify the functionality of an application to ensure the app functions seamlessly and delivers a great customer experience.

• Regression testing:

It is performed to ensure no existing features are affected even after frequent changes in the software’s functionality.

• Mobile application testing:

In this testing type, several tests are performed on mobile apps to ensure their compatibility, functionality, and reliability across devices and OS.

Non-Functional Automation types:

• Performance and load testing:

This test is performed to check the speed, responsiveness, reliability, and stability of an app under fluctuating networks, bandwidths, and user loads.

• Security testing:

The main aim of this test is to ensure that the applications are free from all vulnerabilities and security loopholes. The security tests are vulnerability tests, penetration tests, scanning, auditing, etc.

• Usability testing:

This test is performed to ensure proper app navigation, active links, and the proper usability of an app.

• Accessibility testing:

Business apps should be accessible to everyone, including people with specific disabilities like hearing loss, impaired vision, cognitive disabilities, etc. This testing method ensures that the app follows all accessibility guidelines like W3C’s WCAG 1.0/2.0/2.1/2.2, BITV 1.0, Section 508 & Stanca Act, etc.

Major test automation tools to leverage

1. UiPath Test Suite:

It is an open-source RPA testing tool that can automate any desktop or web app. This RPA tool offers a complete suite for functional testing under one roof. The test suite contains StudioPro, Orchestrator, Test Management Hub, and Test Manager. UiPath can be hosted in virtual terminals or cloud environments and works well with .Net, Java, Flash, PDF, Legacy, SAP, etc.

2. Tricentis TOSCA:

It is an AI-driven, next-gen test automation testing tool that allows Agile and DevOps teams to achieve test automation goals rapidly. This tool enables teams to go beyond continuous testing with AI. Tricentis allows automating end-to-end testing of software applications. This tool combines multiple aspects of software testing (test case design, test automation, test data design and generation, and analytics) to test GUIs and APIs from a business perspective.

3. Selenium:

It is an open-source web automation tool and supports all OS like Windows, MAC, Linux, etc., and web browsers like Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, etc. It comes with a record and playback feature that helps test web applications. Testers can run various scripts in parallel using Selenium, making the test automation process faster. Code can be written in Java, PHP, C#, Python, Ruby, Perl, etc.

4. Ranorex:

It is an all-in-one test automation tool for desktop, mobile, and web. This tool allows codeless test automation and can be used for testing software functionality. This software testing tool supports cross-browser and cross-platform testing. Ranorex easily integrates with the DevOps pipeline.

5. TestComplete:

It is a widely used test automation tool for mobile, desktop, and web. This tool supports various languages and can be used to perform keyword-driven and data-driven testing.

Conclusion

Test automation undoubtedly has become the need of an hour for all businesses as it helps achieve high-quality software. Automation testing reduces regression time and ensures the faster releases of quality software. Testers today prefer test automation as it saves them from repetitive mundane tasks. However, there are some human error by testers which may lead to testing automation failure. Some of these bugs can be avoided by adopting best test automation practices. Businesses can leverage test automation from a next-gen QA and for quality software and a great CX.

How can TestingXperts help to overcome your Test Automation Challenges?

• TestingXperts (Tx) has enabled test automation services for majority of its clients across industries.

• Tx has expert QA teams with expertise in all leading open-source and commercial automation tools.

• Tx has an in-house extensible automation framework, Tx-Automate, (modular, reusable, and compatible) that can be customized based on the business need.

• Tx has many tool partnerships with leading enterprise tools such as UiPath Test Suite, Tricentis, AccelQ, etc., which ensures seamless test automation services and competitive pricing.

• Our test automation engineers have enabled the RPA UiPath Test Automation framework for global clients such as Spotify, a leading audio streaming company in Sweden and the US.

• Tx would be a one-stop solution for all your automation software testing needs. Get in touch with our automation experts to know more.

The post How to Avoid Common Test Automation Challenges and Failures? first appeared on TestingXperts.

Today, enterprises benefit widely by leveraging test automation to get faster releases, improve product quality, enhance productivity, and have a quicker ROI. While many other businesses are leveraging Robotic Process Automation (RPA) to automate their business processes, free up resources, improve operational efficiency and reduce manual tasks. So effectively, RPA and test automation are the two strong pillars that businesses leverage to add on many benefits. But both have many differences with respect to their primary objectives, which have been detailed in this blog.

Test Automation and RPA functional overview

Test automation is the process that involves the usage of automation tools (Open source and Commercial) to develop test scripts based on use cases, help maintain test cases, execute them and finally analyze the test results. Software test automation ensures faster releases as processes are automated without much manual interference and delivers quality releases.

RPA is best suited for enterprise business process automation to improve the operational efficiency of the processes as bots are employed instead of humans. The wider adoption of RPA can be attributed to increased efficiency with minimal human intervention as a software bot is trained to perform tasks and interprets actions seamlessly.

An overview of Test automation

Software test automation is an important aspect of DevOps-driven projects that facilitates continuous delivery and continuous testing. Test automation helps to assist developers and testers automate repetitive tasks to save time and increase test coverage. QA engineers use various automation tools and frameworks to validate the system’s functionality. If QA engineers were to execute these tests manually, the test results may take longer hours, be prone to errors, and might sometimes overlook bugs. Automation testing allows QA engineers to run the tests over different environments and devices repeatedly. As the QA and testing ecosystem has evolved, automation testing has become a critical aspect of quality assurance and delivers many benefits for enterprises.

1. Reduces cost:

Companies leveraging automated software testing bring down the overall cost, resource utilization, and time and lowers overall QA costs up to 60%.

2. Faster Testing:

Automated testing needs little to no human intervention. Once set up, multiple tests may be executed at once, and teams can have detailed reports in less time and reduce QA cycle times by 80%

3. Faster feedback cycle:

Using test automation tools, QA engineers can provide feedback to the DevOps department faster and enhance the overall efficiency.

4. Faster time-to-market:

As the testing process is automated, automation engineers have more time to create better and more in-depth tests that increase the test coverage. Thus, time is saved with continuous testing, leading to shorter product launches and invariably results in faster time-to-market.

5. Larger Test Coverage:

An overview of RPA

RPA is the process of imitating an end-user on the app or software and performing the same tasks automatically. Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning algorithms are implemented for the process, which learns the patterns from the actions of the users. RPA is achieved when bots with custom and diverse capabilities, adapt as per the user actions are then convert them into actions. These actions are then executed when required and without the user. Organizations use RPA due to its wide range of business benefits.

1. Operational efficiency:

RPA bots do not need a break and can work 24/7 and 365 days a year

2. Time-efficient:

RPA-based bots are highly efficient in bringing down the time taken to complete the designated tasks

3. Accuracy in results:

RPA bots deliver with a high accuracy rate and work without fatigue like any other machine-led tasks

4. Cost-effective:

RPA can reduce operational costs by automating key IT processes

5. Secure and reliable:

In the case of RPA, information is exchanged through secure paths. Hence, the chances of any data leakage or security breaches are minimal

6. Data and analytics:

Analytical data offered by RPA is error-free and can be considered for future business planning

7. Optimal Resource Utilization:

Some Use Cases of Test Automation

Banking

• Authenticate customer login through both valid and invalid data

• Ensure that the user can update the balance and make deposits into the new account

• Verify that authentication works as expected and users are redirected to the dashboard

• Ensure all the links of different modules are functional

Insurance

• Ensure that customers can enroll in the policy benefits

• Verify that the application or software can make changes to the customer’s details and that the same is updated in the database

• Verify that users can cancel the policy

• Ensure that users can make payments through all modes like NEFT, Cheque method, etc.

• Verify that the claims are settled successfully.

Healthcare

• Ensure that members can be enrolled, reinstated and terminated.

• Verify that the correct details like account number or address are chosen for a member, service provider, and broker.

• Since healthcare apps generate reports across different formats such as HTML, PDF, and text, verify that the report is easily accessible to the respective users.

Some Use Cases of RPA

Banking

• Optimize critical processes such as replacement of lost or stolen cards, charge processing billing and payments, and blocking cards on customer requests

• Automate the regular operations of the KYC process and improve security and compliance

• Improve the client verification process by fetching and displaying the required customer service documents on a single screen

Insurance

• Verify the NCB slab by referring to the status from previous policies

• Collect data from all the necessary sources to process claims at a faster pace

• Read and process data for details and update the database regularly

Healthcare

• Schedule patient and doctor appointments

• Collect data from each stakeholder and strengthen collaboration between internal and external stakeholders. Centralize the process to perform efficient auto-billing that promotes cost and time savings.

• Ensure the overall system is compliant with all the industry standards by identifying and removing the exceptions using bots

• Optimize claims processing by tracing and auditing payments using simplified bots

RPA vs Test Automation – Key Differences

The following table compares RPA vs Test automation. It will help in understanding how these two technologies differ from each other.

Conclusion

Test automation and RPA are used by enterprises to ensure faster and quality releases and automate business processes, respectively. These strategies revolve around automation and may sound similar but are different based on various factors and modes of working. Test automation aims to automate the test scenarios, while RPA strives to automate the business processes. In the case of RPA, processes are automated by mimicking the tasks and actions performed by a human by leveraging AI and ML. Further, test automation works on test scripts created over strict rules, focuses on different software QA and testing scenarios, and leverages various automation testing tools. Leverage test automation and RPA testing services from next-gen testing services providers for superior outcomes.

Our Test automation framework- Tx-Automate

Tx Automate framework is a modular, reusable, integrated, and compatible framework with new components which can be easily accommodated without affecting existing components. The Tx-Automate architecture has BDD Framework, Plug & Play Framework mode, Test Management, Bug Tracking, Test Libraries, Browser Support, and Code Quality Checks.

Business benefits:

• Shorter design time: Over 40% reduction in test design time using pre-automated test scripts

• Reduced maintenance costs: Over 20% reduction in maintenance costs due to reusability of the framework across multiple applications

• Faster time to market: Up to 90% reduction in cycle time and improved test execution productivity leading to an overall 10% reduction in time to market

• Better decision making: Improved visibility due to comprehensive test reporting allows for more accurate strategic decisions

• Consistency of automation across the organization: Consistent and standardized automation across the enterprise results in better efficiency and utilization of resources

• Higher development productivity: Enabling process automation and suite integration within the development cycle, leading to better productivity

• Single framework with the capability to automate Web, Mobile applications, and APIs

Our UiPath RPA Framework (Tx Robot-led Test Automation Framework Powered by UiPath)

Important Features:

• DevOps ready

• Integrates with various third-party tools like JIRA, Jenkins

• Designed using Page Object Model

• Contains many components and integrations

Business Benefits

• Jumpstart automation within no time

• Loosely coupled DevOps ready framework that helps in integrating ALM Defect tracking and CI/CD tools

• Readily available libraries and reusable assets

• Accommodates new components and processes without impacting existing components

• Eliminates human-prone errors

• Robots developed with this framework are used to create complex automation test scenarios for web, mobile, desktop, and APIs

• Reduced Man hours by 90%

• Even manual testers can create test scripts using robots

The post 8 Key Differences Between Test Automation and RPA first appeared on TestingXperts.

Today’s businesses leverage technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), Natural Language Processing (NLP), Robotic Process Automation (RPA) for automating their tasks and other business processes. Though these next-gen technologies have helped businesses achieve their goals, as we advance, companies need to upgrade themselves by adopting Intelligent Automation(IA), which typically combines the power of AI, ML, RPA, and other advanced technologies.

Content 1. An overview of Intelligent Automation 2. Differences of Intelligent Automation with RPA and Hyperautomation 3. Why should businesses leverage Intelligent Automation? 4. How Intelligent Automation is transforming the BFSI industry? 5. An overview of Intelligent Automation Testing types 6. Conclusion

An overview of Intelligent Automation

Intelligent Automation, also known as cognitive automation combines advanced technologies like: – RPA, – BPM, – AI, – ML, – Analytics, – OCR, – ICR, – Process mining to create end-to-end business processes that think, learn, and adapt on their own. Moreover, this intelligent automation accelerates digital transformation, automates repetitive tasks, ensures freeing up resources, improves operational efficiency, and effectively simplifies various business processes.

Differences of Intelligent Automation with RPA and Hyperautomation

Why should businesses leverage Intelligent Automation?

Streamlines back-office processes and increases efficiency:

Intelligent automation can speed up business processes and streamline tasks per business needs, ultimately increasing process efficiency.

Improves customer service:

This technology helps businesses get real-time access to customer information, accelerate the resolution of customer requests, and help identify additional product/service needs.

Frees-up employees for higher-value work:

Improves governance and fraud detection:

Interprets big data:

Helps in decision-making:

Reduces cost & saves time:

How Intelligent Automation is transforming the BFSI industry?

Intelligent automation is now leveraged across industries and impacts the BFSI sector significantly. Since the BFSI sector plays a vital role in the economy, there is constant pressure on BFSI institutions to improve business performance and lower operational costs. Due to the complexities of data, increased regulatory scrutiny, back-office inefficiencies, and outdated legacy systems, the BFSI sector faces many challenges. The BFSI sector needs to leverage intelligent automation testing to overcome these challenges. This technology helps BFSI institutions reduce costs, boost overall business performance, and deliver a great experience to employees and customers.

1. Banking Sector:

• Frees up banking team for higher-value work: Employees in banks have to regularly deal with repetitive and time-consuming tasks such as entering customer details, KYC process, etc. But, with the help of IA, various tasks can be automated and completed with much accuracy and at a faster pace. This frees up employees and allows them to focus on other high-value tasks.

• Allows customers to open a bank account remotely: Gone are the days when customers need to visit the bank to open bank accounts. But, now, with IA in place, customers can open their accounts remotely. Customers need to complete online KYC, submit required documents, fill in the necessary details and open their accounts in no time.

• Eases general ledger: Banking employees have to regularly maintain and update the ledger daily, a time-consuming and critical task. With the help of IA, banks can collect, update and validate large amounts of information from multiple sources faster and more effectively.

2. Finance Sector:

• Eases the application validation process: Employees working in the finance department have to manually validate applications that consume a lot of time and effort. But with IA technologies such as OCR, NLP, Intelligent Document Processing (IDP), etc., documents can be automatically processed easily in no time.

• Helps in detecting fraudulent activities: IA solutions can continuously monitor real-time transactions and can analyze the patterns of these transactions that help in detecting fraudulent activities such as anti-money laundering, frequent deposits of large amounts, frequent withdrawals, etc. It can also alert the concerned party and help prevent financial fraud in Fintech businesses.

• Eases financial audits: Finance audits are very complex and involve evaluating financial statements, tax calculations, checking amounts payable, and more. With IA, these tasks can be effectively automated, and chances of human-prone errors can be removed.

3. Insurance Sector:

• Makes credit risk assessment accurate and reliable: IA in the insurance sector plays an important role. This technology can intelligently screen prospective borrowers and assign them a risk score based on their ability to repay loan amounts. This process further helps various institutions to make an informed decision regarding credit/loan approval/rejection.

• Ensures faster claim processing: Claim processing is a complex and time-consuming task. Typically, insurance agents need several days to gather data and process claims. But with the help of IA, claim processing and even settlements can be done faster and more effectively without any risk or manual errors.

• Provides intelligent insights: IA tracks and records customer journey and makes insightful recommendations to suggest policies suitable to customer needs based on these recommendations. This further helps customers to manage their insurance money better and ultimately enhances the customer experience (CX)

Other industries where Intelligent Automation is making an impact

1. eCommerce:

• IA utilizes the power of AI technology that records the customer data and their shopping journey and makes recommendations each time customers visit the site for shopping.

• It helps businesses to make decisions about procurement by predicting demand and supply.

• It also enables seamless checkout with their shopping carts while smart algorithms calculate the amount to be charged and ensure seamless transactions to users.

2. Manufacturing:

• Physical and digital robots driven by IA are used to perform various tasks and replace/supplement humans in the manufacturing sector.

• Digital bots help manufacturers process a large amount of data and streamline the ordering process, procurement, appointment scheduling, and alerting.

• It also enables predictive analytics, utilizes machine vision technology, and enables quality inspection that is much more reliable and detailed than humans.

3. Logistics and Transportation

• IA helps truck drivers find the fastest and most cost-efficient routes by utilizing the power of analytics and predictive insights.

• IA has made the concept of self-driving cars into reality, and even drone delivery has been made possible due to the AI technology behind IA.

4. Healthcare

• The healthcare industry is rapidly using AI and RPA technology that goes behind IA to provide better patient outcomes and services.

• AI-powered chatbots are used to make appointments with doctors and provide online consultations.

• Intelligent bots are used to perform surgeries on the head, neck, eye, etc.

• Advanced AI technologies are being leveraged to enable accurate analysis of medical images, such as CT scans, MRIs, and X-rays, which significantly reduce the chances of human error.

5. Telecom

• The Telecom sector has always been data-intensive, and IA helps manage large amounts of data effectively.

• Automated call centers powered by advanced technologies reduce wait time for customers, accelerate the customer query resolution process and enhance the CX.

• IA also helps telecom service providers improve the quality of their network operations by automating the testing, addressing, remediation, and maintenance procedures.

• Intelligent Automation plays a major role across industries and AI-powered apps and solutions must be properly tested to ensure greater outcomes for businesses.

An overview of Intelligent Automation Testing types

UiPath Test Suite based Test Automation:

AI Testing:

AI-Based testing:

RPA Testing:

Conclusion

Intelligent Automation driven by cognitive and digital capabilities is changing the future of all industries, especially for the banking, financial, and insurance sectors. This technology is one of the significant drivers accelerating business growth and ensures a great customer experience. The combination of AI and RPA’s strength in the form of Intelligent Automation is helping businesses improve the quality, speed, and productivity of processes. While some businesses have already realized its importance, others need to adopt it. If you are an enterprise looking for intelligent automation testing, TestingXperts (Tx) can be your one-stop solution.

Tx is a proud partner of UiPath and has been providing UiPath process automation leveraging various UiPath tools to speed up the testing process. Our teams have hands-on experience with the UiPath test suite and provide next-gen intelligent automation testing services to clients across industry domains. We also have an in-house AI-enabled comprehensive platform – Tx-SmarTest that systematically caters to faster releases enabled with DevOps CI/CD implementation. This platform significantly helps boost the software quality through production, which is enabled by combining AI, ML, Deep Learning, and Neural network algorithms.

The post How Intelligent Automation Is Transforming The BFSI Industry first appeared on TestingXperts.

What is Bot-led Testing?

» UiPath Insights [Reporting Dashboard] » Standalone HTML reports » Email Notifications » Defect creation on JIRA » UiPath Test Manager

While this framework is continuously being enhanced to include many more features and making it more scalable, maintainable and configurable, we conducted a Proof of Concept (PoC) to validate usability and extensibility of developed components and explored features available within UiPath Test Suite. In this PoC, we developed Robots to create complex automation test scenario for web, mobile, desktop and API that gets triggered through built-in CI Pipeline i.e. Jenkins..

● Test execution capabilities on multiple machines, distributed across teams and through job scheduling makes the execution process autonomous and straightforward. (Ease with which we can publish our code to Orchestrator & execute on any machine, share it across teams, and on top of all that scheduling jobs is very convenient)

● Control identification: The automation framework is highly robust as it supports data-driven testing, integrates with various packages. It’s control identification using image recognition is reliable compared to other tools. (Although UiPath uses image recognition & OCR & control properties, image recognition on UiPath seems to be more reliable to what has been seen on other prominent tools.)

● Dashboard: The reporting/ dashboard capabilities provided by ‘UiPath Insights’ gives significant statistics, metrics and analytics with the flexibility to play with raw data available in SQL server. (UiPath Test Suite hooks to a SQL server at backend & posts various stats in DB. This opens up a plethora of options to play with & create any kind of stats we want to display. UiPath Insights does give a lot of these stats out-of-the-box)

We also noted some of the areas where we would like to see some improvements in their platform:

● Improved script maintenance for lengthy and complex workflows – the visualization of test cases can become tricky to follow

● Support for WCF services when it comes to API automation – though it is legacy now but something to be considered

● Improved product distribution and deployment process – one-touch installation instead of separate installation for various components of UiPath Test Suite (UiPath Studio, UiPath Orchestrator and UiPath Test Manager)

Overall, UiPath Test Suite is an exciting addition to the already competitive test automation market. The initial results look very promising and the solution we built on top of UiPath Test Suite comes across as fairly ROBUST and RELIABLE.

For more information, please feel free to contact us or email us at uipath@testingxperts.com

The post Robot-led Test Automation using UiPath Test Suite. Findings and Viewpoint of TestingXperts first appeared on TestingXperts.

Contents

1. What is Test Automation Framework?
2. Why do we use automation framework in test automation?
3. What Is the purpose of a Test Automation Framework?
4. What is the need for Test Automation Framework for enterprises?
5. Different Types of Framework used in Automation Testing
6. What are the major advantages of Automation Frameworks for Enterprises?
7. What are the steps for an effective Test Automation Approach?
8. What Is Selenium Automation Framework?
9. What are the types of tests to test automation frameworks?
10. Is there an intelligent and easy-to-use Test Automation Framework?
11. Why Should Enterprises Leverage Tx-Automate framework?
12. Conclusion

Software testing undoubtedly forms an integral part of the application’s software development lifecycle (SDLC) and earlier manual testing was more popular. But, today with agile and DevOps software methodologies on the go, and the enterprise’s quest for faster releases and quality products, it requires software testing methods that are faster and more efficient than manual testing methods. It is at this point the software test automation architecture enabled through test automation frameworks comes into prevalence and is today leading the charts of software testing.

What is Test Automation Framework?

Techopedia defines Test Automation Framework as a set of guidelines for creating and designing test cases. It is a conceptual part of the automated testing that helps testers to use resources more efficiently.

A framework is defined as a set of rules or best practices that can be followed in a systematic way that ensures to deliver the desired results.

Typically, a broader description of test automation framework shows that it consists of a set of processes, tools, and protocols that can be collectively used for uat testing of software applications.

An automation testing framework is a platform developed by integrating various hardware, software resources along with using various tools for automation testing and web service automation framework, based on a qualified set of assumptions. This framework enables efficient design and development of automated test scripts and ensures reliable analysis of issues or bugs for the system or application under test (AUT).

The important functions of software testing automation frameworks are broadly defined as they are effectively used to identify objects and arrange them to be reused in test scripts, perform some action on these identified objects and further also used to evaluate these objects to get the expected results.

It can be inferred that a testing framework is an execution environment for automated tests which revolve around a set of assumptions, concepts, and practices that successfully support the designated process of automated testing.

Why do we use automation framework in test automation?

It is essential to use a framework for automated testing as it specifically improves the automation testing team’s efficiency and test speed. This automation testing framework also helps to improve test accuracy, and drastically reduces the test maintenance costs and lowers risks involved. Due to the numerous advantages of automation frameworks, test automation has become a fundamental component of today’s agile and DevOps practices.

What Is the purpose of a Test Automation Framework?

– Enhances efficiency during the design and development of automated test scripts by enabling the reuse of components or code

– Provides a structured development methodology to ensure uniformity of design across multiple test scripts to reduce dependency on individual test-cases

– Enables reliable issue and bug detection and delivers proper root-cause analysis with minimum human intervention for the system under test

– Reduces dependence on teams by automatically selecting the test to execute according to test scenarios

– Refines dynamically test scope according to changes in the test strategy or conditions of the system under test

– Improves utilization of various resources and enables maximum returns on efforts

– Ensures an uninterrupted automated testing process with little man-power involvement

What is the need for Test Automation Framework for enterprises?

As mentioned, the test automation framework consists of a set of guidelines for creating and designing test cases. They form an important aspect of automated testing as it significantly helps testers to use resources effectively and efficiently. These automation frameworks also help to configure and create test suites by combining various automated tests and make them available for execution.

In general effective test automation support rigorous functional tests and also prove to be more useful as they require shorter design time. These automation testing frameworks ensure more consistency of automation across the organization and brings in higher developmental activity.

Enterprises often face the dilemma of balancing costs and managing resources select automation frameworks that could cover all their business scenarios to deliver quality applications. Evidently, by selecting and implementing best test automation framework, enterprises can significantly increase the speed of test execution and accuracy of the testing process to deliver higher return on investment (ROI) and quality products. Hence, enterprises should choose effective types of automation framework to ensure effective testing of their applications.

Different Types of Framework used in Automation Testing

There has been a significant evolution of these  over the years and some of the important types of these frameworks are:

Linear Scripting Framework:

This framework is based on the concept of record and playback mode that is always achieved in a linear manner. It is more commonly named as record and playback model.

Typically, in this scripting driven framework, the creation and execution of test scripts is done individually and this framework is an effective way to get started for enterprises.

The automation scripting is done in an incremental manner where every new interaction will be added to the automation tests.

Modular Testing Framework:

Abstraction is the concept on which this framework is built. Based on the modules, independent test scripts are developed to test the software. Specifically, an abstraction layer is built for the components to be hidden from the application under test.

This sort of abstraction concept ensures that changes made to the other part of the application does not affect the underlying components.

Data Driven Testing Framework:

In this testing framework, a separate file in a tabular format is used to store both the input and the expected output results. In this framework, a single driver script can execute all the test cases with multiple sets of data.

This driver script contains navigation that spreads through the program which covers both reading of data files and logging of test status information.

Keyword Driven Testing Framework:

Keyword Driven Testing framework is an application independent framework and uses data tables and keywords to explain the actions to be performed on the application under test. This is more so called as keyword driven test automation framework for web based applications and can be stated as an extension of data driven testing framework.

Hybrid Testing Framework:

This form of hybrid testing framework is the combination of modular, data-driven and keyword test automation frameworks. As this is a hybrid framework, it has been based on the combination of many types of end-to-end testing approaches.

Test Driven Development framework (TDD):

Test driven development is a technique of using automated unit tests to drive the design of software and separates it from any dependencies. Earlier, with traditional testing a successful test could find one or more defects, but by using TDD, it increases the speed of tests and improves the confidence that system meets the requirements and is working properly when compared to traditional testing.

Behavior Driven Development Framework (BDD):

This has been derived from the TDD approach and in this method tests are more focussed and are based on the system behavior. In this approach, the testers can create test cases in simple English language. This simple English language helps even the non-technical people to easily analyse and understand the tests.

What are the major advantages of Automation Frameworks for Enterprises?

Cost-Effective Benefits

– Helps reduce time-to-market as it delivers continuous execution of automated test scripts
– Ensures enhanced scalability
– Reduces operational costs
– Delivers faster and quality products for launch
– These frameworks ensure higher test performance over manual testing
– Though initial costs are high but lowers overall maintenance costs
– These automation frameworks become reusable and brings in cost-effectiveness as they can be used for similar testing needs in the future with the same test scripts
– Delivers comprehensive defect management reports

Application-Efficiency Benefits

– Identifies defects early with effective detection of bugs and issues
– Ensures maximum test coverage as end-to-end automation testing frameworks are used
– Reduces manual efforts as tests are fully automated and need less manual intervention
– Most significant usage is with respect to code reusability
– Delivers greater efficiency as testing time consumed is reduced
– Automated scripts save lot of QA time and ensures quality is maintained and delivered
– Automated tests can run anytime,anywhere as the system runs them automatically
– Bug tracking reports deliver comprehensive reporting that is useful to DevOps teams
– With agile and DevOps, and continuous deployment, test automation and continuous integration is the key and pre-requisite to ensures continuous testing is achieved

What are the advantages enterprises get with Cloud test automation frameworks?

– Delivers real-time communication
– Facility to access data and resources anytime/anywhere
– Supports parallel testing across various platforms, OS and environments eases testing process
– No need of any upfront costs
– Ensures faster time to market
– Delivers cost effectiveness

What are the steps for an effective Test Automation Approach?

1. Evaluate to understand the real need for automation based on application type

2. Define automation goals and priorities

3. Plan automated testing strategy

4. Select the right automation testing tool & testing framework based on project requirements

5. Decide on what test cases to automate

6. Develop good quality test data

7. Create automated tests more resistant to UI changes

8. Execute the tests for the test scripts developed

9. Test early and often with continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pattern

10. Maintain the test scripts for future use

What Is Selenium Automation Framework?

Selenium is a leading test automation framework that is portable and is used for testing web applications. This tool provides a record and playback feature for authoring functional tests.

Some of the other test automation frameworks effectively used by testers are the integration testing framework, UI testing framework and more commonly used are the keyword driven frameworks.

Based on the application under test, these testing frameworks should be chosen in order to get the complete advantage of using these best test automation frameworks.

What are the types of tests to test automation frameworks?

Before using the testing frameworks, it is important to perform a number of tests on these frameworks which include:
– Functional testing,
– Learning tests,
– Upgradability testing,
– Installability testing,
– Portability testing,
– Interoperability testing,
– Performance testing,
– Suitability testing,
– Syntax testing,
– Usability testing
– Understandability testing along with static analysis
All this can be performed to ensure the successful performance of these test automation frameworks.

Is there an intelligent and easy-to-use Test Automation Framework?

Tx-Automate – An Intelligent and Ready-to-Deploy Test Automation Framework

TestingXperts’ has developed an innovative and extensible test automation framework, ‘Tx-Automate’ – a reusable, integrated and compatible framework. It has ‘out-of-the-box’ and best ‘in-class features’ for test automation. These test automation framework features include rich custom reporting, third party integrations, configurable execution options and supports all latest tools.

This end-to-end testing framework helps to configure test suites by combining various automated tests and makes them available for effective execution.

Tx-Automate helps in drastically reducing the effort to kick-start automation and offers a fully operational test automation solution.

Framework Overview (Tx-Automate)

– Matured Continuous Integration/ Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) solution across a diverse set of applications (Digital, IoT, API, Legacy and more)
– Best-in-class features for test
– Rich custom reporting & configurable execution options
– Supports integration with market-leading test automation framework open source and commercial tools
– Supports functional and non-functional tests within an automated pipeline

Framework Key Features (Tx-Automate)

– Scalable, robust and reusable
– Manages a large number of scripts in real-time
– Easy to maintain test scripts
– Common reusable components include function library, driver script & configuration files
– Consists of separate features related to Test Design
– Consists of separate features related to Test Execution and Test Reporting

Framework Key Advantages (Tx-Automate)

– Tool agnostic solution which can integrate with all leading tools of automation testing like Selenium, Appium
– Generates rich UI based output reports with details for different stakeholders
– Supports complete integration into the development pipeline with CI tools
– Supports integration with third-party tools like test, defect & version management
– Interfaces with Cloud-based providers for on-cloud test execution
– Integrated to deliver performance testing and can be used for functional testing

Why Should Enterprises Leverage Tx-Automate framework?

– Integrates with all latest market trending new technologies
– Flexible framework (as simple as a Plug and Play)
– Integrates well with alternate frameworks supporting many programming languages
– Supports Cross Browser Testing
– Reusable Components
– Command Line Execution
– Integration with Test Management and Bug Tracking Tools
– CI Integration with Jenkins
– Multiple Notification Formats
– Object Identification Page Object Model

Conclusion

With the agile and DevOps practices on the go, there is a need for faster releases and quality products. Test automation using test automation frameworks has many advantages such as faster defect detection, reusable test scripts and minimum intervention by humans while running the test scripts.

However, for enterprises to take complete advantage of these automation frameworks, they should consider leveraging independent next-gen software testing services providers who have already developed fully functional test automation frameworks that needs a simple plug and play to ensure faster and continuous releases.

The post Test Automation Frameworks – Why, Types, Benefits, Approach first appeared on TestingXperts.

Contents 1. An Introduction to Selenium Testing 2. What type of testing is selenium commonly used for? 3. What are the benefits of test automation? 4. What are the steps for Selenium testing? 5. What are the best practices for Selenium Testing? 6. Why should businesses prefer Selenium Automation Testing? 7. How to learn selenium automation testing? 8. Selenium vs QTP vs RFT 9. Conclusion

An Introduction to Selenium Testing

What are the components of Selenium?

1. Selenium Remote Control (RC)

2. Selenium IDE (Selenium Integrated Development Environment)

3. Selenium WebDriver

4. Selenium Grid

What type of testing is selenium commonly used for?

What are the benefits of test automation

What are the steps for Selenium testing?

What are the best practices for Selenium Testing?

Take stance of an application under test (AUT):

Leverage page object model (POM):

Usage of right locators:

Tests should be independent of each other:

Proper usage of Wait and Sleep commands is critical:

Prefer using latest Java Runtime Environment (JRE):

Why should businesses prefer Selenium Automation Testing?

Selenium vs QTP vs RFT

What is QuickTest Professional (QTP)?

QTP is an automated testing tool that helps testers execute automated tests for identifying gaps, defects or errors in an application that is being tested. QTP uses the platform of Visual Basic scripting for carrying out the automation testing process.

A few of the tools offered by QTP are as follows:

What is Rational Functional Testing (RFT)?

RFT is an object-oriented, automated, functional and regression testing tool. RFT helps to perform functional, GUI, regression and data-driven testing. RFT works well with a range of applications such as .Net, Java, Siebel, Ajax, PowerBuilder, SAP, Adobe PDF documents, Adobe flex, Windows, Silverlight.

QA teams leverage the potential of RFT to perform automated regression testing.

Difference between Selenium and QTP:

Difference between Selenium and RFT:

How to learn selenium automation testing?

Conclusion:

The post Selenium Testing Overview and Why Should Businesses Leverage It for Automation? first appeared on TestingXperts.

Enterprises across industries continue to demand faster releases and quality software to withstand the ever-changing market scenario and competition.

With enterprises following DevOps and agile methodologies of software development, software testing forms an integral part of it. The earlier manual method of testing does not suffice the present-day connected devices and complicated architecture applications with industry 4.0 in place.

Contents

1. What is Automation Testing?
2. What does Test Automation Do?
3. Significance of Automation in Testing for Enterprises?
4. What-are-the-Benefits-of-Automation-Testing?
5. What are the Various Components of Automation Testing?
6. Automation Testing Tool Best Practices
7. What is the Actual Process of Test Automation?
8. What Does an Automation Tester Do?
9. What are Automation testing challenges and how to overcome them?
10. Automation Testing Vs Unit Testing
11. Why Should You Leverage Next-gen Testing Services Provider for Test Automation?
12. Related Queries on Automation Testing

There is a need for businesses to adopt test automation that ensures faster and quality releases along with saving considerable time, and efforts.

What is Automation Testing?

According to WIKI, automation testing is the use of software separate from the software being tested to control the execution of tests and the comparison of actual outcomes with expected outcomes.

Test automation can automate some repetitive but necessary tasks in a formalized testing process already in place, or perform additional testing that might be difficult to do manually.

Test automation can speed up the release cycles, increase coverage and ensures quality software releases.

In manual testing, a human is involved to perform the manual tests that are more prone to human error and might even lack their correctness. This sort of human involved testing encloses many gaps which are seen and sometimes even have missed project timelines due to the huge number of misidentified bugs.

But, as automation testing involves the usage of tools and test scripts to test the software, the results are more reliable and delivers accurate results while testing various use cases and user scenarios.

Hence, this sort of automation testing ensures effective outcomes and can be successfully used by businesses to ensure faster and quality releases.

Automated testing is also known as test automation is a method in software testing that effectively makes use of special test automation tools. These tools are used to control the execution of tests using well-crafted test cases for each of the user scenarios and compares the actual test results to the predicted or the expected results.

It is actually a process that validates if the software is functioning appropriately and meeting the given requirements using these test automation tools.

What does Test Automation Do?

Automation testing meaning can be broadly defined as the process which involves running scripts that are executed by leveraging software testing tools. Automated test systems ensure high accuracy and reliability of the test results.

As no human observations are involved, it ensures more accurate test results. Moreover, this sort of automation testing using open source and paid test automation tools is most suitable for regression testing, performance testing, load testing, security testing along with other types of testing.

Significance of Automation in Testing for Enterprises?

Software testing is essentially an important part of the software development life cycle (SDLC) and should be taken up to ensure quality software.

Earlier manual testing was the major mode of testing but with advanced applications and connected devices in place, it is essential to have Test Automation to ensure faster and quality releases.

Even smaller and mid-sized companies in their quest to have good quality products continue to adopt test automation best practices to deliver high-performing products to their clients.

For enterprises, with automation in testing in place, there is a faster feedback cycle and that brings faster validation at various phases in product development.

The other benefit of automation testing is the testing procedure becomes automated as the test scripts are run by the test automation tools without much interference of QA.

Test automation also helps enterprises to improve the communication between DevOps, QA teams and product owners who depend on the results of these automated tests as these results are more reliable than the manual testing results.

It is more important to note that automation testing is best suitable for applications that need to be tested for various versions, platforms, and operating systems.

Test automation involves the usage of tests that are repeatable and can be run many times to test various conditions and scenarios.

It is best suited with regression tests and high-risk functionality tests to check whether they fail under real-time conditions.

These automated test results help to save businesses of any probable loss due to their application failure as with effective automated software testing the results are more reliable.

What are the Benefits of Automation Testing?

There are many benefits with Test Automation which have been broadly classified as Qualitative and Quantitative benefits.

Qualitative Benefits of Automation in Testing

– Speeds up the testing cycle with automated runs

– Reduces test execution time effectively

– Increases test coverage on each testing cycle

– Ensures ease of test case maintenance

– Reduces the need to update scripts in case of changes to the application

– Ensures faster test scripts generation

– Facilitates reusability of code

– Reduces manual intervention and they can be utilized for functional testing

– Reduces testing timelines significantly

– Reduces regression testing time enormously

– Saves time as automated testing brings in more efficiency

– Improves test accuracy compared to manual testing

– Breaks up large business processes into smaller components to be re-used multiple times

– Ensures longer automation code life

– Increases the team’s testing speed

Quantitative Benefits of Automation in Testing

– Generates quicker ROI

– Reduces QA cycle times by up to 80%

– Lowers the overall QA costs up to 60%

– Improves organizational efficiency

– Ensures cost optimization

– Delivers faster time to market

– Helps improve the business bottom line

After having known about the various benefits of Automation testing, it is necessary to know about the different types of automation testing.

What are the Types of Automation Testing?

Unit Testing:

This is the first type of automation testing in which the individual components of an application are tested. These tests are usually written by the developers but sometimes automation testers also write them. These tests are usually performed during the software development phase.

Smoke testing:

This type of testing is performed to check whether the build is stable or not. If the build is not stable, then it will be sent back to the developers as an unstable build and if the build is stable then testers will accept it to perform further testing on the build.

Black box testing:

This form of testing is performed to check if there are any incorrect or missing functions, checks for the existence of any interface errors, or any behaviour related or performance errors and also checks the presence of termination errors if any.

Integration testing:

In this integration testing, the application modules are typically integrated logically and tested as a group. Essentially, this form of testing checks and verifies the data communication between different modules of the application.

Functional testing:

This form of testing is done to check if all the functions work as expected or not. This involves testing APIs, database, security testing and also tests the overall functionality of the application.

Regression testing:

This is an exhaustive testing methodology done to check whether all the existing features are functioning well even with recent code changes.

It basically verifies that the old code works in the same way as they were before making any changes to the code.

What are the Various Components of Automation Testing?

Automated unit tests:

These tests are primarily designed and crafted to test the software code. These tests categorically search for script errors, or if any bugs or any other issues within the written code.

Automated web services tests:

These tests are useful to test the user interface part of the web services. Protocols like SOAP and REST are used to test a web service.

This sort of testing determines the XML request and validates the response against the request sent which is achieved by the web services testing.

Automated API tests:

These tests allow the software to communicate effectively with other software applications. These API tests help to check the functionality and security of underlying layers.

Automated GUI tests:

These tests focus on testing the graphical user interface of the application under test.

It involves checking the screens with various controls like menus, buttons, icons, and all types of toolbars, menu bars dialogue boxes, and windows.

Automation Testing Tool Best Practices

Below listed are 6 best practices for test automation tool:

1. Select the right automation tool:

Testing teams must select the right automation testing tool that is in-line with their project requirements which helps them to execute automated test cases in an effective manner.

2. Design tests before automating them:

It’s always preferred and is considered as a good practice to create test cases before initiating the test automation process. A good test design will eventually help in finding defects and fixing them.

3. Don’t plan to automate unstable functionality:

Whenever there is a new feature or functionality that is to be tested, care should be taken such that automation testing will be taken up only for stable functionalities.

4. Decide which tests to automate:

Every feature cannot be automated as there are certain features that require manual testing. A proper automation test strategy needs to be put in place to fulfil all those test cases that need to be automated.

5. Early and frequent testing:

To leverage test automation, it is much better to start testing early on in the software development process. By running automated tests often, testers will be in a better position to detect bugs and resolve them at the earliest. This would save time and cost which would have been spent otherwise on fixing bugs at a later stage of the software development process.

6. Do not completely rely on UI test automation:

Completely relying on UI test automation is not considered as a best practice as every application might have some UI changes done. Hence, UI testing should be planned carefully to ensure the app delivers a great user experience to end-users.

Some of the Most commonly used Test Automation tools are:

Below is the automation testing tools list that will help you understand more about each of these tools

Selenium:

Selenium is one of the most popular test automation tool and is the preferred tool for web automation testing for DevOps. Selenium offers two parts of its software, Web driver and IDE (Integrated Development Environment). Selenium automation testing is also one of the most preferred automation testing in the market these days.

Appium:

It is an open-source test automation framework that can be used with native, hybrid and mobile web applications to test them.

It facilitates to make use of preferred test practices, frameworks, and tools. It is preferred to automate any mobile app from any language and any test framework.

Cucumber:

It is an Open source automation testing tool that revolves around behavior-driven development.  

Ranorex:

This is a unique test automation tool that can be used to test web apps, desktop or mobile applications.

TestComplete:

This is the first automation testing tool that has AI with a visual recognition engine that can test with or without scripts and the tool can be used to test desktop, mobile, and web applications extensively.

Microfocus UFT:

The Unified Functional testing tool (UFT Tool) is used in regressive and functional test automation.

It also supports API and web services testing, continuous testing, support for testing ERP and CRM applications.

Apache JMeter:

This is the most popular performance testing tool that perfectly measures the performance of your software. It is built on java and runs functional tests to measure the performance of web applications.

Tosca:

This is a very effective testing tool that can be used for end-to-end testing as it supports functional testing, load testing, risk-based testing, test data management and also app testing.

What is the Actual Process of Test Automation?

10 Basic Steps for a Well-Defined Test Automation

1. Evaluate to understand the need for automation based on project type

2. Define automation goals and priorities

3. Plan automated testing strategy

4. Select the right automation tool & framework based upon the project requirements

5. Decide on what test cases to automate

6. Develop good quality test data

7. Create automated tests more resistant to UI changes

8. Execute the tests for the test scripts developed

9. Test early and often with CI/CD pattern

10. Maintain the test scripts

Business Benefits with a well-defined Test Automation Approach

– Delivers quality software products

– Increases release velocity through the CI/CD model

– Reduces human errors as human tasks are automated

– Ensures cost optimization

– Maximizes ROI

– Ensures faster time to market

What Does an Automation Tester Do?

The QA automation tester and the automation test engineers are the main people involved to achieve test automation initiatives. They know how to automate for the successful roll-out of quality products for businesses.

The QA automation tester is responsible for designing and writing test automation scripts as the first phase and they use various types of test automation frameworks to achieve successful test automation.

They run test scripts to ensure all the scenarios are successfully tested and they have a close association with the developers and other QA analysts.

They log bugs and issues in various test management tools such that the developers work on these bugs and fix them.

Once again automated regression testing is done to ensure the new functionalities do not affect the functionalities of existing features.

What are Automation testing challenges and how to overcome them?

Though Test automation brings about a lot of advantages for enterprises. Typically, by using automated testing, an expedition of the process of software validation can be achieved along with achieving increased test coverage.

However, there are a lot of challenges in applying test automation for applications under test (AUT) which need a careful follow-up process to achieve successful test automation implementation.

1. Lack of Proper communication & collaboration between Developer and QA teams: 

Lack of proper interaction and collaboration between developers, QA automation engineers, and operations teams does not signify test automation success.

Hence, it is essential to place the entire team members to get involved in identifying test automation objectives and setting targets.

They also need to spend significant efforts on proper communication between teams to have a clear understanding of the requirements and project specifications to ensure test automation success.

2. Proper Selection of Right Test Automation Tool:

With the availability of a variety of automation testing tools for both open source and paid tools, it is necessary to evaluate properly before adopting a tool. A proper in-depth evaluation of the application under test (AUT) is required.

It should be carefully done and then the tool that appropriately matches the AUT should be chosen.

To overcome it, an expert QA test automation engineer can prove helpful to evaluate the tools based on the application that has to be tested.

3. Lack of Highly Skilled Test Automation Experts:

It is a truth that test automation requires efficient and industry rich technical skills to accurately design and maintain test automation framework and test scripts.

The team should properly build test scripts and maintain them to effectively run test scripts to verify the application performance and further resolve technical issues.

In order to overcome it, automated testing resource(s) should have a strong knowledge of the Test Automation framework’s design and implementation aspects to ensure effective automation is achieved.

4. Involves High Initial Investment Costs:

It is also a known fact that the initial phase of test automation is usually expensive as it is necessary to analyze, design and build a automation testing framework, libraries or reusable functions through a thorough analysis of the AUT.

Further, if a licensed test automation tool is selected, then the operating cost should be evaluated.

Else, if free open-source tools are chosen then also significant efforts should be spent on learning, training and maintaining them.

Hence based on the AUT priority and cost capability available therein, either open source or licensed tools should be selected.

5. Challenges with Scaling Test environments:

This is an important challenge today as QA teams that don’t provision test environments in the cloud, continue to face scalability challenges when they introduce test automation.

It is necessary to rapidly provision the different test environments that automated testing requires, scale them up, run the tests, tear them down, to ensure success while testing in the cloud.

The in-house (on-premise) teams usually have a limited number of test environments they can use, which means fewer tests they can deploy at any given time.

As a result, testing takes a much longer time. In order to overcome this, it is essential to move test environments to the cloud to scale the test automation and it will also reduce QA teams operating costs.

Automation Testing Vs Unit Testing

Why Should You Leverage Next-gen Testing Services Provider for Test Automation?

Test automation is nowadays dominating in the Agile and DevOps adoptions. Test automation enables tremendous benefits to enterprises as it ensures faster releases, quality software and also delivers a quicker time to market.

But, in order to achieve successful test automation for all critical projects, it is essential to leverage next-gen automation testing services providers as they use a balanced test automation approach to achieve quality products.

Some of the Highlights of the Approach they perform are:

– Assessment of your automation needs and application landscape

– Assessment of your existing automation solution

– Tool selection, Proof of Concept and implementation

– Automated test script creation and execution

– Creation of regression test suites with flexible execution options

– Training and handover of automation test pack to client for future maintenance

Moreover, with the huge number of benefits with automation testing services, it is time for enterprises to adopt test automation initiatives using either open source or the licensed automation testing tools.

TestingXperts has developed an extensible test automation framework, ‘Tx-Automate’, which is modular, reusable, integrated and compatible.

The framework has best-in-class features for test automation including rich custom reporting metrics, third party integrations, configurable execution options, etc.

The framework helps configure/ create test suites by combining various automated tests and making those test suites available for execution.

Get in touch with our team to discuss further

The post A Beginner’s Guide to Test Automation 2023 first appeared on TestingXperts.

Contents 1. Why Your Business Should Prefer Selenium Automation Testing? 2. Key Features of Selenium Automation Testing Framework 3. Significance of Selenium Automation Testing 4. Best Practices of Selenium Automation Testing 5. Conclusion

Software test automation is the key to success in today’s agile and DevOps processes, as the test automation tools and frameworks deliver faster and quality releases due to accurate testing that is achieved with effective test scripts execution. Test automation tools are available as both open source tools and paid tools. Selenium tool is the most widely used open-source test automation tool. It is best suited for all web applications across browsers and delivers effective results for all tests and is an easy-to-use tool with numerous effective features.

1. Selenium RC:

2. Selenium Integrated Development Environment (IDE):

3. Selenium WebDriver:

4. Selenium Grid:

Why Your Business Should Prefer Selenium Automation Testing?

Key Features of Selenium Automation Testing Framework:

1.Open source availability:

2. Support for Language and Framework:

3. Ease of Implementation:

4. Continuous Upgrades and Updates:

5. Parallel Test Execution:

6. Flexibility:

7. Multi-browser support:

8. Highly-Portable language:

Significance of Selenium Automation Testing:

10 Best Practices of Selenium Automation Testing Framework:

1. Understand the Application at First Place:

It is utmost important for enterprises to have a first-hand understanding of the application to be tested. If automation is required for a web application, then selenium tool can be effectively used. In addition, it is also essential to know about the underlying technologies being used. In case of desktop applications, it is essential to check if any third party controls are involved and have an evaluation of the language used to build that application.

2. Adopt Page Object Model (POM):

This is a popular test automation design pattern that helps to develop robust automation testing frameworks which are resistant to any small tweaks made in the user interface. The major benefit with this page object model is that it enhances test maintenance and reduces the duplication in code. In these models, the web pages are defined as classes and the different elements on the page become the variables and the user interactions are commonly implemented as methods. The POM frameworks are comparatively more reliable and are easy to maintain. The scripts are readable and the test scripts are reusable. It also eliminates duplicity altogether and hence POM is preferred over other models.

3. Adhere to the usage of Right Locators:

At the heart of selenium frameworks is interaction with the browser allowing to navigate, click, type, and check different objects. This all is achieved using different types of locators. These locators include Class, ID, Link Text, Xpath, CSS Selector and Tag Name. Thus, selecting the right locators is utmost important

4. Keep the Tests Independent of Each other:

Independent testing strategy wherein testing a single action or process is independent of the other. This type of testing avoids chained and brittle tests. Hence, tests should be kept as small as possible especially automated functional testing in agile and Continuous integration DevOps models on the go it is always suitable to maintain small tests.

5. Prefer to use Wait command in place of Thread. Sleep:

It is always preferred to use Wait command and it is more important to understand the usage of implicit wait and explicit wait instead of using the Sleep command. This Sleep command waits until the defined time even after the task is completed; while wait command performs the actual time to wait. Sleep command slows down the test while with the Wait, the test time is not affected.

6. Use Selenium for System Functional testing:

Automation testing framework using Selenium is best suited when the same test and the same code is used for different inputs. It is most preferred for system functional testing as well as for browser compatibility testing.

7. Prefer to Use Java Runtime Environment (JRE):

The Selenium server is programmed with Java and hence it is important to use latest version of JRE to avoid any run time errors.

8. Ensure proper communication between QA, Developers, and Operations teams:

With the agile and DevOps methodologies on the go, it is important to have proper collaboration between various teams of QA, developers and operations to achieve successful selenium testing.

9. Follow a Proper Test Naming Strategy:

10. Hire a Dedicated Automation Engineer:

Conclusion:

Enterprises should prefer Selenium as a promising test automation tool for automating all their web applications due to its enhanced features. Leverage our customized selenium test automation frameworks to achieve faster time to market and quicker ROI along with assured quality results. Connect with our testing experts today!

The post 10 Effective Practices to Follow for Selenium Automation Testing first appeared on TestingXperts.

We have discussed FinTech challenges and the growing need for QA in the industry in our first post in this series.

Contents 1. TestingXperts’ (Tx) accelerators and Test Automation Solution to Overcome FinTech Challenges 2. Tx’s Banking Financial Services and Insurance Center of Excellence (Tx BFSI CoE) 3. Tx Enablers to Accelerate Quality Engineering for the FinTech Enterprises 4. Tx’s Portfolio of End-to-End Managed Testing Services 5. Conclusion

In this post, let’s look at ways to overcome the challenges of testing a FinTech application, with TestingXperts’ specialized next-gen FinTech testing solutions.

As per some researches done to identify key causes of FinTech software application failures, one of the main reasons turned out to be poor software quality. Therefore, it is critical to carry out stringent QA on FinTech applications to avoid poor quality launch to end users.

TestingXperts’ (Tx) accelerators and Test Automation Solution to Overcome FinTech Challenges

Placing special attention on testing your Fintech app results in an application that works reliably across various channels. This gives company a good reputation in the market while enabling it to deliver excellent customer experience. Below mentioned are TestingXperts’ (Tx) accelerators and test automation solutions, which can be leveraged to overcome many potential FinTech application testing challenges.

Tx’s Banking Financial Services and Insurance Center of Excellence (Tx BFSI CoE)

TestingXperts’ dedicated BFSI CoE focuses on offering comprehensive range of solutions for testing FinTech applications, which includes tests across key segments in the industry. The CoE is built across the key pillars of People, Processes and Technology to ensure right skills, competencies, tools, frameworks, re-usable business scenarios/ test cases, methodologies and infrastructure are in place.

Tx Enablers to Accelerate Quality Engineering for the FinTech Enterprises

TestingXperts has a wide range of next-gen proprietary testing frameworks, such as Tx-Automate, Tx-IaCT, Tx-Insights Dashboard, Tx-Reusekit, Tx-Insure, and more which effectively align with the needs of the FinTech market and help in improving quality and reducing the time to market of a FinTech application.

Tx’s Portfolio of End-to-End Managed Testing Services

To ensure a seamless FinTech application experience, it is imperative to evaluate performance, security, and business functions of the application. TestingXperts provides comprehensive testing approaches and strategies through its portfolio of end-to-end managed testing services, including Functional testing (Manual and Test Automation), Non-Functional Testing (Performance Testing, Security Testing and Usability Testing), Test Advisory services and specialized next-gen solutions.

Conclusion:

If you want your financial firm to be competitive and achieve a winning position in the BFSI space, you must develop and launch high-quality FinTech applications in the market. Enhancing the quality of your FinTech application (software/product/service) will have the highest overall impact on your business and financial performance. Therefore, make sure your FinTech application testing strategy is comprehensive and covers all aspects of testing.

Connect with us to build a robust testing strategy for your FinTech application.

The post FinTech – Overcome the challenges of testing a FinTech application with TestingXperts first appeared on TestingXperts.