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The revolution in software development based on newer technologies has brought into sharp focus the importance of software product testing. To address the present day challenge of staying in competition by achieving customer satisfaction, the software product testing process has undergone a flurry of changes.

These changes have led to the shortening of the product lifecycle and validation of its quality in terms of functionality, performance, and security. So, what was earlier the traditional waterfall testing method, has given way to automation in the form of Agile and DevOps. The focus, therefore, is not on testing the product after its development but embracing shift left testing. According to this model, testing and integration are part of the early development cycle as opposed to the traditional approach.

Let us find out the latest trends in software product testing strategy and know how they help to keep all the stakeholders happy and contended – developers, testers, management, and customers.

#1 QA to Quality Engineering: If the traditional Quality Awareness process is about testing a product in the post development phase in a step by step manner (read waterfall,) the manual approach leaves a lot to be desired. Moreover, the changing market dynamics and user preferences have necessitated the quick delivery of quality products. To address this challenge, the traditional testing model has been found to be wholly inadequate due to the following reasons.

• Step by step manual process is lengthy, error prone, and time consuming.
• The process entails the previous steps to be fully completed before the new step could begin. This slows down the testing process considerably.
• Since manual testing of numerous variables and dependencies is time consuming, not to speak of inducing fatigue, the manual testers often reduce the testing area.
• The low attention span of manual testers means a lot of hidden glitches are left untouched. These glitches impact the quality of software leading to customer dissatisfaction.
• Customer dissatisfaction affects the brand image of the company besides inviting lawsuits and regulatory censure.

To prevent the inadequacies associated with the waterfall model of QA, the model of Quality Engineering is used. The aim of the latter model is to prevent errors from creeping into the software. This is ensured by introducing test automation during the development stage instead of testing a product just before the delivery phase.

#2 Agile and DevOps: The shift towards Quality Engineering follows Agile and DevOps methodologies. According to these, the SDLC entails the development and testing teams to work simultaneously in sprints. So, if a module is written, it is sent to the testing team immediately. And if the testing team finds any error in the module the same is sent back for correction. This way, each module is first tested as part of the development sprint followed by its integration. The Agile method uses test automation in a big way and turns the software product testing services iterative, quick, and seamless.

However, with the delivery of a rich customer experience becoming the sole objective of business, the Development and Testing teams are combined with the Operations team as part of the DevOps model. This model aims at carrying out continuous testing and integration to make the product glitch free and updated with the latest trends and versions. DevOps ensures a software application has a proper interface with various devices, screen resolutions, platforms, frameworks, and networks. Besides validating software functional testing, DevOps secures a software against cyber threats from malware, trojans, ransomware, and viruses as well.

#3 Big Data Testing: With applications becoming more complex due to their interfacing with a range of devices, networks, frameworks, etc., a lot of data (in terabytes) gets generated. This humongous amount of data needs to be tested thoroughly by using sophisticated tools, analytics, methodologies, and frameworks.

#4 Internet of Things (IoT): The use of embedded software in devices in the form of sensors, actuators, etc., has necessitated the need for software application testing. The IoT testing should validate the functionality, performance, and security of the embedded software. This is of prime importance to ensure the successful functioning of the device in accordance with the test outcomes.

#5 Open source tools: The rising cost of test automation has turned the focus of using open source test automation tools (read free) such as Selenium. The built-in flexibility for customization and other benefits have made these tools highly sought after ones by the testers.

Conclusion

The challenges of developing sophisticated software that stands firm on the crucible of quality have brought about a raft of changes in Quality Awareness processes. These lead to quicker product updates, rich user experience, and ROI for business.

This Article is originally published at Medium.com, Top 5 Trends in Software Product Testing.