Are you testing your product in the most effective way? Say Goodbye to Manual testing and Hello to Automation Testing

Today covid-19 pandemic has completely flipped the business model. Various conventional Business models like banking and health had to adopt the digital era. Even the school and colleges have to create various applications so that they can provide online learning for their students. All these statements justify the modern business model as completely dependent on the performance and the functionality of various web applications. In this condition, the testing of the web application goes a long way in determining a smooth end-user experience. However, due to the rapid increase in the demand for web applications, companies need to improve the efficiency of their testing environment. 

In this article, we are going to discuss how Automation Testing can help a company improve the efficiency of the testing environment. We will also discuss various reasons to justify the replacement of manual testing with automation testing in certain areas. 

The Creation of Test Automation

During the early years of software development, companies didn’t have any modern technology. So, the developer had to follow the conventional method and test the functioning of the web application with manual intervention. It was a lengthy and time-consuming process as a single human tester had to perform all the testing operations. Companies started to miss their delivery date by huge margins ultimately hampering end-user satisfaction. In this modern Development Industry, you cannot expect a customer to stick to your company just because of brand loyalty. Providing properly functioning high-quality web applications is the only way to maintain user retention. This was one of the primary reasons for the rise of test automation in the Software Development Industry. 

Test automation helped the web application developing companies to save a lot of time by automating the repetitive testing processes in the web application development life cycle. Companies started to witness massive advantages of this extra time. For instance, they can use this time to create innovative features to add in the future update of the web application. However, the company must remember the high initial investment charge that comes under test automation. 

Advantages of Test Automation

Many companies hesitate to introduce test automation due to the significantly higher introductory charges. This hesitation is properly visible for individual creators and small startup companies. However, many industry experts suggest that companies should consider test automation as a long-term investment. This point of view will help them to analyze the massive advantages that test automation will provide in the due course of time. To justify this point, let us consider some of the major advantages of automation testing:

●      Contrary to popular beliefs, Automation Testing is a cost-efficient testing method. In case the developer manages to overlook the initial charges, he will save huge amounts of money in the long run.

●      Automation testing helps to maintain the proper collaboration between different teams involved in the web application development life cycle. This means that the development, production, testing and quality assessment team can perform synchronized effort creating the applications. Automation Testing also allows various integrations like DevOps to further improve the collaboration between these teams. 

●      Automation Testing plays a major role in improving the quality of the web application. It reduces the work of the developers by performing rigorous regression testing on the web application. This allows the developers to focus on improving the core functionality of the web application. 

●      The massive test coverage and quick test deployment allow developers to quickly complete all the testing processes. This process allows the companies to deliver high-quality applications to their end-users in a short period.  

●      One of the major advantages of automation testing is the deployment of parallel testing. Using this feature, the developers can test the compatibility of the web application on thousands of different browsers, browser versions, devices and OS simultaneously. This process also plays a major role in reducing the overall testing period for the web application.

●      Automation Testing helps web developing companies to deploy live test coverage. With the help of this feature, the developers do not have to wait for long periods to receive the results. This process also helps them to detect any errors in the core framework of the web application and remove them as soon as possible. 

The process to Introduce test Automation in the Most effective way

1. Importance of the Tool Selection Process

Tools play a major role in improving the efficiency of an automation test environment. However, the developers must remember that they cannot buy any tool from the market and introduce it to the environment. A web developing company must understand the uniqueness of every tool and its specific purpose. The best process of evaluating this uniqueness is to perform market research on the present automation tools. During the tool’s selection, companies should also consider their preferences and project requirements to shortlist the perfect tool according to their needs. It is also a great idea to have proper knowledge about the recent test automation market trends. Let us use LambdaTest as an example to understand the important role of a test automation tool during the web application development life cycle. 

LambdaTest is a cloud-based platform to verify the cross-browser compatibility of web applications. Using this platform developers can verify the functionality of the applications using a safe and Secure Selenium grid. LambdaTest also provides end-to-end encryption to securely test the sensitive data involved in various web applications. LambdaTest also helps web developing companies to natively verify the proper functioning of the locally hosted web applications.  Due to trustworthiness and unique features, thousands of companies globally use LambdaTest to perform test applications in their web development environment. 

2. The Proper Balance Between Automation Testing and Manual testing

The primary focus of this article was to justify how Automation Testing can replace manual testing in various areas. However, the developers must remember that it is practically impossible to completely replace manual testing with automation testing. This is because certain testing processes are almost impossible to conduct without any form of human intervention. For instance, tests like visual testing and exploratory testing cannot be performed without a manual tester. In visual testing, the developers have to verify the proper placement of all the visual elements like pictures and videos. While on the other hand, exploratory testing requires the knowledge and experience of a human tester. In this form of testing, the developers have to detect all the errors in the web application that were previously overlooked with automation test scripts.

So, the best way to create the most efficient test environment is to maintain an optimal balance between automation testing and manual testing. The developers should also remember that they have to use certain tools that will help to synchronize the test reports from these two sources. Companies should also train those testers more efficiently so that they can implement this efficient form of testing. 

3. Balance Between Native and Cloud Testing

Since the introduction of cloud-based testing, developers have been developing this belief that cloud-based services can completely substitute real devices. However, in reality, virtual machines or emulators can never take the place of real devices. This is because, without device testing, the test results will not be considered conclusive. Now, it is illogical for a small company to spend thousands of dollars to set up a device testing lab. In this situation, the best solution is to use an automation testing tool that does all these things on your behalf. 

Currently, there are various tools like LambdaTest that help the developers to test the functionality of the application on not only emulators but also real devices. These test results ensure that none of the physical factors like screen size or device resolution affects the functionality of the application. This is one of the most essential steps to ensure that you provide the most optimal User experience to your customers.

4. Implementation of Performance Testing 

The performance of the web application is one of the most important factors to ensure smooth functioning.  While performing performance testing, you must also ensure that none of the external factors negatively affect the application. The external factors can include a bad network connection, the remote location of the customer or an outdated operating system version. All these factors are highly essential to ensure that the web application is accessible to a wider user base. In this competitive web Development Industry, you cannot afford to alienate any segment of the user base just cause of device or platform incompatibility.  Proper performance of the web application also helps to control the bounce rate for a web application.

5. Proper Understanding of the User Base

It is practically impossible for a company to test the functioning of a web application on every platform or web browser. This is because there are thousands of different browsers currently available in the market. Furthermore, more and more new Browsers are added every single day. So, web developing companies must have a proper idea about the preferences of the audience to optimize the test experience. For instance, they must perform user research to understand the most popular device and operating system in the present market. The developers can also analyze the results from Google Analytics to understand this concept. All these factors will help the company to customize the testing experience according to the preferences of the user. 

The Final Verdict

So, we can easily conclude that Automation Testing will continue to dominate the web development industry in the coming years. With this form of testing, companies will have immense potential to revolutionize their testing environment. In the coming years, various web developing companies will also integrate advanced Technologies with test automation to improve its efficiency. These Technologies will include cloud-based services and artificial intelligence. Many experts suggest that companies should pay proper attention to training their automation testers. This process will help them to utilize the full potential Automation Testing environment. 

The automation testers should also have a basic idea of various programming languages that the company uses. This process will help them to maintain synchronized efforts with the development team and introduce Automation Testing during the early stages of the development cycle.  The companies should also remember that the tool selection process has a vital role in ensuring the success of the test environment. These factors will guarantee a bright future for the web developing company in the coming years.