What is Web Application Testing?

Web application testing is a software testing and quality assurance process wherein flaws and defects that may cause the app to become inoperable are identified and fixed. Web application testing ensures that all the bugs are removed before the apps are live. Web applications are accessible via various browsers, operating systems, and networks. There are many benefits for businesses with web application testing which ensures their users get the best possible UX. Before deep-diving into the concept of web app testing, let us have an understanding of web apps and their types.

An overview of web apps and their types

A web application is an app that can be accessed via a web browser and does not require any specific installation process. These apps simplify user interaction and enable the users to send and receive data via web browsers. This interaction can be as simple as listening to music or as complex as making online transactions. Web apps may be classified into two major categories of static and dynamic web apps based on their features.

Types of Web Apps

1. Static Web Apps: These apps appear to the end-users as they are stored on the server. Common examples of static web apps are portfolios and website landing pages.

2. Dynamic Web Apps: These apps fetch data in real-time as per the user’s request. Since the databases are located on the server-side, the end-user gets updated information in real-time. These are mostly the dynamic web apps further divided into the below sub-categories.

 2.1. Single-page apps: These apps continuously rewrite the current page rather than loading new pages from a server. Example Gmail app.

2.2. Multi-page apps: Multi-page apps reload and display new content from the server whenever the user performs a new action. Some examples of multi-page apps are Amazon and CNN.

2.3. Portal web apps: These web apps provide a range of categories on the home page. The home page may contain features such as a cart, profile, etc. like student and patient portals.

2.4. Progressive web apps: These apps rely on web browser APIs and features of mobile devices to provide a native experience across different devices. Some examples of progressive web apps are Spotify and Pinterest.

2.5. eCommerce web apps: These apps are online stores that offer primary features of any eCommerce app, such as searching and adding products, making a transaction, buying products, etc. some of these apps examples are Amazon Flipkart, etc.

2.6. Animated web apps: Apart from the features provided by traditional web apps, animated web apps enable businesses to represent content using various animated effects. Some of the examples are Apple, Squadeasy, etc.

2.7. Rich internet apps: These apps are used by businesses to resolve browser restrictions as they depend on plugins like Flash and Silverlight. Rich internet apps (RIA) have features similar to their desktop version and offer an interactive user experience. Some examples are Adobe Flash and MS Silverlight.

2.8. JavaScript (JS) web apps: These apps are built using the JS frameworks such as Angular.js, React.js, and Vue.js. These JS web apps provide enhanced user interaction as well as SEO optimization. Due to the ability to handle user requests and respond, most client portals are JavaScript web apps. Some examples are LinkedIn and Uber.

Different web apps perform multiple buying activities, listening to songs, reading books, performing online transactions, etc. There are many benefits for businesses with these apps, and these apps should perform seamlessly and deliver a great UX.

Benefits for businesses with web application testing

1. Improves app efficiency:

By performing web app testing, it improves the app efficiency to ensure scalability, robustness, and seamless app navigation.

2. Enhances user experience:

GUI testing ensures that the UI of the web application is customer-centric and meets the end users’ expectations. It ensures that the app is verified for common UI defects such as font, color, navigation, etc. GUI testing enhances the user experience, converting more users into customers.

3. Improves app scalability:

Maintaining the optimal user load and verifying it using load testing ensures high-speed functioning of the web applications even during peak times.

4. Prevents data breaches:

Security is fundamental to gaining customers’ confidence and creating a good brand reputation. Security testing safeguards a web app against critical security issues such as data breaches, threats, and vulnerabilities.

5. Ensures cross-platform compatibility:

Compatibility testing of web apps ensures these apps are accessible across OS and browsers.

6. Increases user conversions:

Usability testing aims to optimize the user experience and ensures that app features are easy to navigate and the users can consume the app’s content without any hindrance.

1. Functional testing:

QA engineers verify that the initial build works as expected. Common features tested in functional testing are link testing, cookie testing, HTML & CSS validation, etc.

2. Usability testing:

Security testing method ensures that the app navigation is user-friendly and the web application’s content is easily accessible.

3. Compatibility testing:

This test method verifies whether the web app design is compatible with most browsers and devices.

4. GUI testing:

Ensures the UI of the web app meets the customer requirements and that the app is seamlessly accessible to users.

5. Cross-browser testing:

Users may run a web app on any browser. So, cross-browser testing is performed to ensure the app runs without any issues on all of them.

6. Database testing:

This testing includes reporting errors found while executing queries and maintaining data integrity while managing data in the database.

7. Performance testing:

Validates the web app against different load and stress conditions and at different internet connection speeds to ensure proper scalability of the web app.

8. Security testing:

This testing method helps identify potential vulnerabilities in a web app and subsequently strengthens its security.

9. Accessibility testing:

Business apps should be accessible to all people, 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. This test method ensures equal access to apps for all and helps in expanding the user base.

Key challenges while performing Web application testing

1. Uncontrolled web app environments:

Testing a web app is relatively diverse and challenging compared to traditional software application testing. Since web applications work on a wide range of screen resolutions, operating systems, hardware, etc., comprehensive test coverage across all environments is impossible and needs testers’ proper evaluation.

2. Frequent UI changes:

As businesses add new features to these web apps, it becomes difficult to integrate these new functionalities or add third-party tools or new logic to the code. Moreover, these recent UI changes make the testers struggle to maintain the UI test scripts and need to balance with the changes.

3. Difficulty handling image comparisons:

While performing web automation testing, managing image comparisons becomes a challenge. The usability testers should carefully handle the different pixel variations, such as shape, size, color, etc., so seamless image conversions are done.

4. Usability issues:

Typically, these usability issues are one of the key reasons behind a web app failure. Web apps usually fall behind user expectations when they inefficiently deliver multiple features into a few screens. The QA teams should create the test plans and calls by leveraging proper usability testing tools to ensure seamless navigation across the web apps.

Six Important facts to look for in Web app testing

1. When testing web applications, evaluate some key areas such as HTML page interactions, TCP/IP communications, and JavaScript

2. Validate applications for CGI scripts, database interfaces, dynamic page generators, etc.

3. Test the web applications across browsers and OS and also test for the localization and globalization

4. Test the web URLs for their proper functioning

5. Check the website for any typos, grammar mistakes, and incorrect punctuation

6. Ensure that old pages are mapped to new ones to avoid loss of content during the transition

Some web application testing scenarios

•  The user navigation flow across different pages of the website

•  Whether the user can select/deselect checkboxes, radio buttons, etc.

•  If the user can select required values from the Dropdown list

• Whether all the command buttons such as Save, Next, Upload, Reload, etc. are working well

• If the Search functionality across the web pages is working correctly

•  That there are no broken links

•  For the proper functioning of the tab order across pages

•  If the Default values for each web page are displayed

•  For the Email functionality, if any

Trending web application testing tools in 2022

1. UiPath:

An RPA tool leveraged by businesses for large-scale end-to-end automation via test robots that execute tests on-demand, continuously, and at scale.

2. TOSCA:

An automated testing tool that enables functional and regression testing of GUIs and APIs from a business perspective.

3. AccelQ:

An AI and ML-powered tool that provides a codeless automation testing facility for API and web application testing.

4. TestComplete:

A functional automated testing platform that enables QA engineers to create automated tests for Windows, Web, Android, and iOS apps.

5. Selenium:

An open-source test automation tool that offers test automation facilities over a wide range of OS such as Windows, Mac, and Linux and leading web browsers such as Chrome, Firefox, and Edge.

6. HP UFT:

HPE Unified Functional Test is a reliable cross-platform web UI testing tool. UFT is integrated with HP ALM (Test Management Tool) and HP LoadRunner.

7. Cypress:

An open-source tool that QA engineers use to test web apps using JavaScript frameworks. Cypress enables testers to view the execution of test cases simultaneously and in real-time as they create the test cases.

8. Leapwork:

A point-and-click test automation tool that enables QA testers to design and execute web automation test cases via visual flowcharts.

10. LambdaTest:

A cloud-based cross-browser testing tool validates JavaScript, CSS, HTLM5, and other web app elements across the leading web browsers. LambdaTest offers support for manual, visual, as well as automation QA.

Conclusion

Web applications have become an essential medium for businesses with seamless accessibility over various operating systems, screen resolutions, and browsers. However, the true potential of these web apps revolves around their scalability, robustness, and high performance to deliver a great UX. Therefore, these web apps should be tested thoroughly before releasing them into the market. Leverage web app testing services from a next-gen testing services provider to get web apps with seamless functionality and navigation to deliver a great UX.

How can TestingXperts help?

TestingXperts follows a comprehensive QA strategy that handles the unique requirements and challenges of web application testing. Our in-house accelerators, frameworks, and our core differentiators help businesses to quicken releases and ensure quicker time-to-market

TestingXperts differentiators for web application testing:

• Ready-to-use next-gen AI-accelerator (Tx-SmarTest) and Robot-Led UiPath test automation framework helps deliver faster outcomes.

• Ready-to-use in-house test automation accelerator ‘Tx-Automate’ reduces the regression cycle time by 80% and increases test coverage

• Flexible engagement models to meet customer business needs

• Tool partnerships with leading vendors like UiPath Test Suite, Tricentis Tosca, AccelQ, etc.

•  IP-led services accelerate delivery and optimize costs significantly

Connect with our web application testing experts to improve the overall user experience of your web applications with our next-gen specialist testing services.

The post Web Application Testing – A Complete Guide for Businesses first appeared on TestingXperts.

Contents 1. What is Automated UI Testing and Web UI Testing? 2. Benefits of Automated UI Testing 3. Why Should Businesses Leverage Automated UI Testing for Web? 4. Challenges with Web UI Automation Testing 5. How to Overcome Web UI Automation Challenges? 6. What is the Importance of tools in Automated UI Testing for web? 7. Some of the leading Web UI Automation Testing Tools 8. Conclusion

What is Automated UI Testing and Web UI Testing?

Today, businesses are mostly dependent on their website or mobile applications. These modes of business activities revolve around customer interactions, order processing, and transaction processing.

Thus, these channels become an important revenue stream for businesses. In recent years, there has been migration from traditional desktop applications towards other forms of web-based apps and mobile applications.

Today, businesses are in a need for automating web-based tests in their testing processes. This helps to gain an effective user interface (UI) and evidently delivers great user experience (UX) to end-users. This effectiveness can all be achieved by leveraging web automated testing.

UI Testing is the process used to test the graphical user interface(UI) for any defects. Since automation is in demand globally, one of the important methods of UI testing is Web UI automation testing which is used to verify and validate the UI components of various web-based applications. Today’s end-user will appreciate websites, web-based apps or test automation mobile apps, only if they deliver great UX along with an effective UI that enables seamless performance.

Basically, the web UI testing revolves around the graphical user interface (GUI) testing that includes testing of both the functionality and usability of the website or the web app. By specifically using web UI testing, it refers to testing GUI elements like fonts, layouts, buttons, checkboxes, images, colours, etc.

Typically, this web UI testing process concentrates on how the look-and-feel of the website appears to end-users. When the web UI testing is done by using automated web UI testing tools then it is comprehensively named as automated web UI testing.

Benefits of Automated UI Testing

1. Results are accurate:

UI testing ensures that the testing of the user interface is carried out through a well-defined test strategy. This ensures that the entire UI testing activity comes out to be highly productive.

2. Improved coverage:

Through the implementation of UI testing, there is improved coverage as different tests such as functional tests, performance and stress tests, unit tests can be carried out on various devices at a faster rate.

3. Finding errors:

Finding regression errors is one of the main benefits of UI testing, as a lot of time is saved through faster detection of regression errors in the development process.

4. Detecting behaviour differences:

Behaviour differences can be detected between platforms such as Windows/Mac/Java versions, different operating systems and different web browsers.

5. Increased efficiency:

The entire process of UI testing is efficient as the bugs are detected early and testing issues are solved quickly.

Why Should Businesses Leverage Automated UI Testing for Web?

Website UI testing is required to ensure the effective performance of the website and automated website testing is preferred today as this process ensures better test coverage and faster test execution. Automated UI testing for web using automation tools ensures that the web app meets the design and development specifications and ensures a user-friendly website to end-users.

Hence, this sort of automated web application UI testing is performed to find defects either in the functionality or in the design of the website quickly. This web testing process is quite critical to achieving high-quality websites, but the testers face certain challenges while performing automated UI testing for the Web.

Challenges with Web UI Automation Testing

Though automated web UI testing is very important, this process involves certain challenges that should be handled by the testers. Testers should carefully follow the UI testing checklist for the web application and follow the testing process as it includes certain challenges.

1. Multiple error handling:

Error handling is a tedious process with web UI automated testing. Especially when there are large projects with complex scenarios then typically error handling becomes tough.

2. Handling of frequent changes in UI and maintaining UI test scripts:

It is a known fact that web applications’ UI is prone to changes in terms of logic, adding new features, new integrations, or due to new functionalities during the development process Thus, the UI is more prone to changes and the UI testing scripts maintenance becomes a challenge.

3. Image comparison:

Handling of image comparisons is an important aspect of automated UI testing. It is a crucial factor as pixel variations in size, color, shape, and formats should be handled effectively while testing website UI.

4. Testing UI elements:

Web UI automation testers often face a lot of hardships while testing UI elements.

5. Longer test script execution time:

Typically, web UI automation requires more execution time depending on the number of test cases, and often it takes more time for execution.

6. Increasing testing complexity:

As today’s modern applications have complex features such as embedded frames, maps, flowcharts, diagrams and more. These make the UI tests to become more difficult and challenging while testing them.

7. ROI of UI Automation:

It is a fact that application UI keeps changing and simultaneously the test scripts should also be changed. This primarily increases the time spent on Web UI testing and it becomes difficult to calculate the ROI while continuously performing these UI tests.

How to Overcome Web UI Automation Challenges?

1. Choose right UI test automation tool:

It is essential to choose the right framework for web UI automation. Choose a right automation tool that easily integrates into your workflow. Moreover, selecting an effective web UI automation tool helps to record and playback the modules. It also helps the testers and QA teams to generate reports with screenshots to identify error sequences quickly.

2. Prefer to choose codeless automation testing tools:

It is necessary to prefer codeless web UI automation tools as these codeless UI automation tools eases the process of script maintenance, and testers can save both time and cost.

3. Choose Common UI Elements to ease UI testing process:

It is preferred that developers should use common UI elements such that it becomes easy for testers to understand them quickly without any difficulty.

4. Leverage an object repository:

It is preferred to choose a shared repository to reduce test maintenance and reduce the associated costs. In order to ensure effective UI test cases success, it is better to reduce the UI test cases in the initial testing stages and then slowly increase them as testing moves forward.

5. Maintain standard organizational-level best test automation practices:

It is necessary to maintain and follow the best code review processes across the enterprise to ensure best test automation practices are adopted.

Automated UI testing for Web is enabled by using various web UI automation testing tools which deliver numerous benefits while testing web applications.

What is the Importance of tools in Automated UI Testing for web?

1. Eases image comparison process:

For today’s modern applications, image comparison is vital and usually these images on a web application are either with a URL or with other images. Therefore, web UI automation tools can be used to support and ease image comparison.

2. Effective for functional testing:

End-users like web apps that have a simple and easy to use navigation which is possible with good functionality. Automated UI testing tools can be used to get information with respect to the functionality of web apps.

3. Supports cross-browser/platform testing:

These automated web UI tools support testing on multiple browsers, multiple platforms and also on various latest devices. The web apps are tested for their performance across browsers and platforms to know their compatibility.

4. Easily Integrates with bug-tracking tools:

UI test automation tools support integration with bug tracking tools such as Bugzilla, JIRA, Mantis, Quality Center, etc. Evidently, this integration helps to log defects into any of the bug tracking tools and thus it becomes easy to track them.

5. Uniquely used for captcha automation:

It is an effective security measure across websites to enter captcha so as to block robots and ensure human angle in the website visitor. UI testing tools support captcha automation and introducing web UI tools with captcha codes becomes essential for businesses.

6. Helps to quickly generate reports:

These web UI application testing tools can be used to quickly get visual reports along with detailed logs. These reports become handy and can be shared across development and testing teams.

Some of the leading Web UI Automation Testing Tools

1. Selenium:

This is one of the most commonly used open-source test automation tool that is used to automated browsers. Selenium Testing supports multiple programming languages such as Java, C#, Python, etc. to create selenium test scripts. Selenium tool is best suited and used for all web applications across browsers.

2. ACCELQ:

ACCELQ is a leading codeless test automation and agile test management platform which is AI based and is a continuous testing platform. This tool is used for quality lifecycle management, API and UI end-to-end validations. It is an effective functional and test automation platform and is next-gen test management platform for manual and automation intelligent test planning and delivers change management.

3. Tricentis Tosca:

Tricentis Tosca is an effective automation tool that supports all testing activities ranging from test design, test automation to test reports along with analytics. It has special features such as dashboards, analytics, integrations, and effective test executions to support CI and DevOps practices.

This tool also offers a user-friendly UI and a rich feature set for designing, executing, implementing and optimizing API tests. These API tests can be used to test across all browsers, mobile devices, and various platforms.

4. QTP/UFT:

Unified Functional Testing (UFT) is an automation tool that provides functional and regression test automation for software applications and environments. UFT tool automates functional testing for web, mobile, API, RPA and enterprise applications by increasing the test coverage from the UI to API.

5. TestComplete:

TestComplete is one of the important automation testing tool that is used to test desktop, web and mobile applications. It is specifically used to build, test and run functional user interface tests with its much useful record and playback features. This tool supports all scripting languages such as JavaScript, Python, VBScript to name a few.

6. Katalon:

Katalon studio is the most widely used open-source test automation tool that can be used to test both web and mobile applications. This tool can be used together with Appium and Selenium. It primarily helps to quickly generate automated tests cross-platform and seamlessly integrates into CI/CD pipeline. Some of its features include an integrated development environment, a base level object repository, object spy and a typical browser plugin, etc.

Conclusion

Automated UI Testing for Web is a critical testing process which businesses should leverage to know about the functionality of various web app GUI features and how they function. Additionally, this web UI automation testing reduces regression testing efforts largely. But, there are certain challenges with respect to web UI automation testing that should be effectively handled by testers. By handling these challenges, it helps to evolve an effective user friendly website and web app that delivers great UI and UX to end-users.

Hence, automated Web UI testing should be leveraged to deliver an effective web application that delivers great satisfaction to end-users. Leverage next-gen testing services provider to ensure a quality web app to your users with thorough web UI automated testing.

The post Automated UI Testing Challenges and How to Overcome Them first appeared on TestingXperts.