The Essence of Agile Testing

Testing is an integral part of any development cycle. Initially, the entire process used to be step by step where after the codes were written by the programmer, the testing team would take over and a long back and forth cycle would begin. These days to shorten the development cycle new types of testing methodologies have been integrated. Agile testing is a methodology in which there is a continuous iteration of the development and testing throughout the software development cycle. As a result, both the coding and development go hand in hand with testing.

What is different with Agile testing?

With Agile, the buzz word is continuous. An agile testing company is into continuous development, continuous integration and continuous delivery while simultaneously doing a continuous delivery.  While this summarizes the entire concept of this kind of testing, it is important that we understand how it actually benefits a company. When many things happen at the same time, it helps speed up the process. Companies that have adopted agile testing services are able to deliver the product much faster. It is not just the speed that is of consequence here. Continuous integration and communication with the end user, developer and tester ensures that the product is as perfect as it could be. Earlier, companies would launch a product and after some time launch its newer version with more features and lesser bugs and continue to do so every few months till the product itself was phased out. With Agile testing, the companies are able to reduce the development cycles. This has in turn shown positive affects on the revenues. 

Adopting Agile testing

When a company adopts Agile testing for its products, it is bringing about a change in the entire work culture. The teams which earlier worked as independent units and only passed on the product after it was finished up to a certain level now work as a cohesive whole. They have to implement strategies on every aspect of the work cycle. So right from how to approach requirement, architecture, design to coding and testing - all evolve to new heights. The teams now have to look at realistic time frames for delivery without getting trapped between the development and testing cycles. So the time schedules are adhered to. In fact, time is fixed before the scope is outlined. Quality and testing also are done on the basis of the new timelines. Instead of waiting for months to look at the product being developed, the next checkpoint is always round the corner for the team to evaluate. It is a win win process for all and therefore it is not a surprise that it is becoming popular.

Source: https://techarcisblog.wordpress.com/2016/09/12/the-essence-of-agile-testing/

How Does Software Testing Help Businesses?

Software testing is generally considered a cost source. Managers usually think of compromising with the quality of software testing to reduce its cost. And at times, they prefer to avoid it completely. Reason? They think that its contribution for building up revenue is not great. However, this belief isn’t true. In fact, Software Testing is very useful for optimization of business. It ensures fast system performance even under highest workload. 

Need of Software Testing

Applications and software are intended to facilitate different tasks within a business organization. If they fail to perform their tasks, organizations can not meet their goals. More often than not, badly tested software fail to provide required output efficiently. Such software also affect the scalability and performance.

Stiff Competition

Today, users are spoilt for choice, and companies face stiff competition. Thus, it has become imperative for all software to work fast and smoothly and deliver performance. If they do not perform according to the expectation of the users, they will switch to your competitors’ products in no time. 

There are a number of things that can help us understand the importance of SoftwareTesting for businesses. Some of them are given below:

Different kinds of Test

There are different sorts of tests that a software testing company conducts to ensure the required performance and desired results. Some of the tests are Load Test, Failover Test, Reliability Test, Stress Test, Targeted Infrastructure Test, Baseline Test, Network Sensitivity Test, Rendezvous Test, Volume Test, and Result Test. Thus, the product is evaluated on various parameters during software testing to ensure better performance.

Advantages of the Software Testing

Software Testing plays a vital role in adding more value by offering the highest quality product to the customers. It helps build your brand image and reputation. Providing high-quality products makes your customers happy. 

You can also escape several unpleasant experiences, thanks to QA & testing. If your customer is not satisfied with the product quality, you might have to take that product back. This whole process not only costs you time and money, but a part of your reputation is also gone.

Thus, software testing services are very important as they help you please and satisfy your customers. Moreover, they are also useful for reducing cost, increasing sales, improving user experience, and optimizing the business.

Why Mobility Testing is Imperative?

There was a time when the phone was a mere device that was kept in one corner of the room and had to ring in order to catch our attention. In fact in the initial days the computer was a device that was hardly used by a few. Now, they have become the basic necessities of life. They are no longer mere devices – they have become an extension of how we are – they are the windows to the virtual world. They have practically changed the way we think, work, behave, learn and even exist.

Mobile technology is here to stay and will change the future of the world as we know it. And we already know it. Let us not state what and how smart phones have become an integral part of our lives. Rather let us concentrate on Mobility Testing Solutions.

Types of Mobile Testing:

We can safely say that mobile testing can be categorized into 2 broad types.

#1 Hardware testing:

In this testing we are talking about internal processors, internal hardware, screen sizes, resolution, space or memory, camera, radio, Bluetooth, WIFI – in short everything related to the Smart Phone industry.

#2 Software or Application testing:

The diverse applications that you sue in your smart phone needs to be tested before they are launched in the market. And it is here that application testing or software testing makes its entry. There are certain aspects that you need to keep in mind here:

Significance of Mobile Application Testing

Mobility testing applications on mobile devices is more challenging than regular desktop testing. The significance and importance of Mobility Testing is huge. Let us go through a few of the reasons why mobile testing is a challenging affair:

• The market is full of diverse range of mobile devices with different screen sizes and hardware configurations which makes it difficult to test the apps. One has to test them in different OS before launching them.

• The configurations of each smart phone are different from the other.

• One has to deal with diverse and opposite operating software’s like Android, Symbian, Windows, Blackberry and iOS.

• Even the mobile network operators are different for GSM and CDMA versions.

• Frequent updates make it vital to check the apps at regular intervals in order to ensure that the application functionality is not impacted.

In the long run it becomes imperative to offer Mobility Testing Solutions so that there is no bug in the product. The presence of bugs can result in monetary loss, huge legal battles with the brand image getting affected in the long run. Hence, one cannot overlook the importance and significance of this type of testing.

There are many service providers out there in the market that offer this service. TechArcis is one of the leading testing solutions providers. When it comes to quality control and quality assurance they come second to none. No matter whatever your testing queries are, just drop us a mail or give us a call. Our experts are there to help you out anytime.

6 Ways to Improve Performance of Distributed QA Teams

It is quite common for organizations to have multiple product lines. Take the case of Microsoft. The brand is massive – Windows and Office being the two biggest product lines. Each product line has plenty of associated applications to deal with, and needs a dedicated sprint cycle and release cycle. This goes deeper in terms of inherent dependencies. The same could be the case with your organization. Your QA team could be spread across multiple product teams with equal divisions. And to top it, they work 10 hours ahead of your time zone! To ensure effectiveness, you have even set up a Scrum team that actually works in different time zones.


However, at the end of the day, some questions still shade your mind- How to maintain consistent communication link with QA team that is distributed? How to make sure Scrum environment is giving effective outcome? Are there any innovative processes that QA Testing Solutions Provider can take help from to attain their objectives?


Well, we have compiled a list of 6 ways to improve performance of your distributed QA teams.


Read more - http://techarcis.com/6-ways-to-improve-performance-of-distributed-qa-teams/

Why is Root Cause Analysis Extremely Important?

When developing a product, while it is extremely difficult to maintain quality of the product due to its complexity and shorter time to market, it is also important to keep the cost low to stay competitive.It becomes essential for the software developers to consider variousaspects while developing any product. Though, all the guidelines are abided, problems still arise in the software in form of defects. There are several factors for the defect to arise and product to fail such as, human factor, communication failure, poor design logic, unrealistic development timeframe, lack of skilled testing, poor coding practices etc.  Besides this, the difficulty intensifies if the same defects recur during the development cycle of the products either new or enhanced versions. The solution lies in conducting the root cause analysis of the defects and then taking corrective actions so that they don’t recur.

What is Root Cause Analysis?

At the very basic level, root cause analysis is a methodology used to find the underlying cause of the defect. As it signifies to product development, Root cause analysis is a systematic procedure for putting the defects in categories and analysing them before release, after the release or both. WhenRCAis performed properly, it shows the points in the development cycle that are causing the main and recurring defects. Root Cause Corrective Action (RCCA) is when corrective actions are applied to solve the problems that occur during RCA. The corrective actions are carried out far upstream in the procedure as possible, as catching failures upstream prevents rework, saves time and money by not letting the problem to take place.

How Root Cause analysis helps reduce recurring defects?

Firstly, the defects are logged and documented. Secondly, the defects are reviewed and analysed using the root cause analysis techniques. But before Root Cause analysis is performed, a Pareto graph is outlined to show the defect type with highest frequency of occurrence which becomes the target. An example of defect classification in a Pareto graph is shown below:

According to the Pareto graph, the category for which the highest numbers of defects are found should be paid attention to at first.

The Root Cause Analysis of a defect follows the below key principles:

• Minimizing the defects to improve quality: the analysis must lead to making changes in processes which help prevention of defects in the early stages and ensure early detection.
• Utilizing local and third party expertise: the people who really know what went wrong should be there to analyse processes along with third party experts. A good debate ensures all possibilities are taken care of, analysed and the best possible action is taken.

With these guidelines, defects are analysed to find their origins. A collection of these causes will help in conducting the root cause analysis in effective manner.

Why Root Cause Analysis is extremely important?

 

The main benefit of RCA is that it finds the fundamental errors in the development process, enabling teams to enact right measures to fix the problems and stop them from recurring ahead. Hence, there is lesser rework and fewer defects in the final product.

1. Reduced cost: the cost of fixing defects increases later the defects are found in the development process and if a defect makes it into the final release, customers may never buy the product again, resulting in loss of revenue to the firm.
2. Identify failure: It points RCA is mainly helpful for teams that think they have apt development and QA procedures but still face recurring defects. Obviously, something is broken but what, why and where are the questions that need to be answered. RCA helps answer these questions and find the real (root) cause of the problem and not just the obvious (direct) cause.
3. Improve safety and reliability: As root cause analysis helps reducing the number of defects in future, it can be mainly beneficial to firms in quality critical industries where product reliability and safety are mainly important.
4. Enhance time to market:  On finding the root cause of a defect and taking the subsequent corrective action, releases of the product take less time in testing and the product is released in the market sooner with lesser uncaught defects.

The benefits of adopting the Root Cause Analysis process to prevent defects are enormous viz. reduces development time and cost, increases customer satisfaction, reduces rework effort thereby decreases cost and improves the quality of the product.