Software Testing Process | Basic Types| Principle | Benefits

Nowadays we are building digital solutions to real-world problems. We are building software to solve the problems that we are facing in our day-to-day life.

Building software follows a certain process known as SDLC(Software Development Life Cycle) or Waterfall model.

Testing is one of the very important steps in the development of a complete product.

Many people don’t like the word testing and everyone wants to get into development.

Why is Testing Important?

There are a lot of risks that are involved in the software that may cause a loss of value or money.

These risks include Scalability issues, accessibility issues, reliability issues, security issues, functional issues and much more.

These risks turn into issues that lead to disaster and chaos which will finally lead to a loss in business.

For example, Starbucks was forced to give free coffees to users due to the register malfunctions. They have hundreds of thousands of outlets worldwide. Can you imagine the business loss?

This is just because of a small technical glitch in development.

It is impossible to develop software with zero bugs as there is no perfect product that can be developed.

The bugs and errors have become so common and there are high chances the software may crash.

So the companies use Software Testing to prevent the product from getting crashed or malfunctioning.

What is Software Testing?

We can define Software testing as

Software testing is a process of verifying and validating whether a software application or product meets the technical and business requirements that guide its design and development.

There are two important terms involved in testing they are Verification and Validation.

• Verification is a process that involves whether our code works properly and provides a proper output.
• Validation is a process that involves checking whether our Software meets all the requirements of the clients. This is a very important step as this will help us to produce a finished product.

Benefits of Software Testing

Do you know why Software Testing is an essential process to produce a finished product?

1. Produces a Good Quality Product
   Once the software is tested there are very fewer chances of bugs or malfunction.
2. Saves Time and Resources
   If the product is directly deployed without testing it may malfunction or the product may be crashed as a result lots of time and resources will be wasted in bringing the product back. So testing in prior will help us to identify all the loopholes beforehand saving time and money.
3. Business Optimization
   Quality test cases will help us to prove that our product is suitable for businesses.
4. User Experience
   A bug-free product always has a good user experience.
5. Customer Satisfaction
   As the software is safe and works properly the customers are satisfied.
6. Brings Profit:
   Once the product satisfies all the requirements it brings more money to the firm.

Principles of Software Testing

1. Detecting Bugs
   All the bugs and errors may not be identified by the developer as the mindset of the developer will be to develop a good product. but a tester’s mindset will be to identify the bugs.
2. Exhaustive testing is impossible
   It is impossible to check each and every combination of inputs in the complex software as it may take years.
3. Early Testing:
   Perform the testing process as soon as possible. So that we can give feedback to the development team.
4. Defect Clustering:
   It has been seen that in a product bugs are identified in 20% of the whole software. It will be better if you check those specific modules thoroughly.
5. Context-Based
   This is based on the type of Software product you are testing. The major priority of testing a certain feature varies from product to product. For example, if it’s a financial product the payment-related modules are tested with higher priority.

Bug-free software is a myth: It is impossible to make a 100% perfect product.

Basic Types of Testing

1. Manual Testing
   This is a process in which you are testing everything manually. So you are checking the inputs and outputs for different test cases.
2. Automation Testing
   This is the testing that is performed automatically by the computer with the help of scripts. We use Junit a Java library for testing each and every unit.

If you are interested in automation testing, read about robotic process automation.

There is another classification based on how the product is tested.

1. Functional Testing
   The working of the product which consists of the code and its output to different types of inputs is tested.
2. Non Functional Testing
   The performance and the scalability of the software are tested in non-functional testing.

There are many tools for software functional testing. The JMeter testing tool is an open-source, industry-accepted and very popular functional testing tool.

There is a new type of testing that is been emerging known as Integration testing. That is testing how the software performs when it is integrated with other services.

This is software testing fundamental. Few more articles related to types of testing and tools used in testing coming soon.

Till that time, if you have any questions related to the software testing, shoot in a comment. I will read and reply as soon as possible.

R.Manoj Aiyer

I am a highly active and passionate guy who loves trending technologies and wants to help others learn and use them to solve real-life problems. I am a tech come Management guy loves blogging, programming and marketing. I’m also a Developer students club lead powered by Google developers.