What is Software Testing and It’s Different Types

Today’s world of technology is completely dominated by machines and their behaviour is controlled by the software that drives them. Software testing provides a solution to all our concerns about machines behaving exactly the way we want them to.

What is Software Testing?

Software testing is the process of evaluating the functionality of a software application to find software bugs. It checks whether the developed software meets the specified requirements and detects flaws in the software to produce a quality product. In essence, it implements a system to identify omissions, errors, or missing requirements that conflict with actual requirements.

This is also known as the verification and validation process for software products. It checks if the software product:

• Meet business and technical requirements that guided design and development
• Work as needed
• Can be implemented with the same properties

Why Do We Need Software Testing?

The success rate of software applications drives our business growth. It plays an important role in the development of applications and software products.

We need software testing for the following reasons:

Profitability- Software testing has many advantages and one of the most important is profitability. If you test projects on time, you can save money in the long run. Software development has many phases, and if a bug is found in an earlier phase, the cost of fixing it is much lower.

Security- This is the most sensitive and vulnerable part of software testing. Consumers are always looking for reliable products that they can rely on. This helps to eliminate problems and risks upfront.

Product Quality- To bring your product vision to life, it must work according to plan. It is important to follow the requirements of the product as this will help you get the final result you need.

Customer Satisfaction- The ultimate goal of the Product Owner is to provide the best possible customer satisfaction. Software should be tested to ensure the best possible user experience. Being the best product in this saturated market will help you attract reliable customers who will have a big long term impact.

Principles of Software Testing

Testing software is a very resourceful and intellectual task that testers have to do. Software or application testing consists of certain principles that play an important role for software testers when testing a project.

The principles of software testing are as follows:

Software testing can help find bugs: Testing software or projects can help find some or more bugs that developers may not be able to find. However, software testing cannot ensure that the project or software you develop is error-free. So it is very important to develop test cases and find as many bugs as possible.

Testing with effectiveness is impossible: As long as your project or application to be tested does not have a clear structure with limited input, checking and testing all possible data sets, modules, and scenarios is impossible or unattainable.

Early Testing: 

The sooner you start testing your project or software, the better you’ll find that you’re making the most of your available time.

Clustering Errors:

During testing, you may find that most of the errors or defects reported are caused by a small number of modules in your software or system.

Software testing is contextual:

There are various methods, procedures, and types of testing that determine the nature and characteristics of an application. For example, applications for medical devices require more tests and evaluations based on doctors than games or small software.

Error-free or bug-free software is a myth:

Just because a tester tested an app and found no flaws in the project, doesn’t mean or assume that your software is ready to launch.

Software Testing Life Cycle (STLC)

Software Test Life Cycle –

The software testing life cycle is a set of distinct activities performed by the test team to ensure the quality of the software or product. It defines a set of activities that are performed to do software testing. It also determines what test activities will be performed and when those test activities will be performed. In the STLC process, each activity is planned and carried out systematically, and each phase has different goals and outcomes.
The different phases of the software testing life cycle are:

Requirements Analysis –

Requirement analysis is the first step in the software testing life cycle. In this step, the Quality Assurance (QA) team understands the requirements related to what we will test and understands the requirements that can be tested.

Test Planning –

Test planning is the most important phase of the software testing life cycle that determines the overall testing strategy. This phase is also known as the testing strategy phase. In this phase, the test manager participates in determining the effort and cost estimates for the entire project. It defines the goals and scope of the project.

Test Case Development –

Test case development begins after the test planning phase is complete. This is the STLC phase where the test team records detailed test cases. In addition to test cases, the test team also prepares test data for testing. As soon as a test case is ready, it is checked by a partner member or QA manager.

Setting Up a Test Environment –

Setting up a test environment is an integral part of the software testing life cycle. The test environment prepares the software and hardware for the test team to run test cases. It supports testing with configured hardware, software and networks.

Test Execution –

The next phase in the software testing life cycle is test execution. Test execution is the process of running your code and comparing the expected and actual results. When testing starts, the test analyzer starts executing the test script based on the test strategies allowed in the project.

Closing the Test Cycle –

The final phase of the software testing life cycle is closing the test cycle. This includes convening a test team to assess and evaluate cycle completion criteria based on test coverage, quality, cost, time, critical business objectives, and software.

Types of Software Testing

Testing is an essential part of any successful software project. The type of test will depend on a number of factors including project requirements, budget, deadlines, expertise, and suitability. Software testing is a very large domain, but it can be broadly divided into two areas, such as:

Manual testing –

Manual testing is a type of software testing where testers run test cases manually without using any automation tools. That is, the application is tested manually by QA testers.

Tests must be performed manually on different data sets in each environment, and the success or failure of each transaction must be recorded. This type of testing requires knowledge, experience, analytical/logical skills, creativity, and intuition.

Some of the tools used for manual testing are:

• Stryka
• Bugzilla
• Jira
• Mantis
• Trac
• Redmine
• Fogbuz
• Lighthouse

Automated Testing –

Automated testing is an automated technique in which testers independently write scripts and use appropriate software to test the software. In essence, it is a process of automating manual processes. Like regression testing, automation testing is used to test applications for workload, performance, and stress.

Automated testing allows you to perform repetitive tasks and regression tests without the intervention of manual testers. While all processes run automatically, automation requires some manual efforts to create scripts for initial testing.

Some of the tools used for automated testing are:

• Selenium
• TestingWhiz
• Ranorex
• Sahi
• Waitir
• WaitiN
• Tosca TestSuite

Selenium is a budget for testing automation. It is considered an industry standard for user interface automation testing of web applications.

This brings us to the end of this blog “What is software testing”. Hope you enjoyed this article and understand what software testing is and what steps are required in the testing cycle.