Manual Testing as a Precursor to Automation
A client specializing in security information integration addressed us with a request to develop a brand new automation process that would meet the needs of a newly launched platform.
The client’s product is a single architecture that allows for monitoring network flows, packets, user info, and resource data. The system’s functionality also includes events and log management, unusual activity detection, incident analysis and response, settings management, and the elimination of vulnerabilities. Once deployed, the analytics system enables a user to conduct correlation analysis in order to detect the most substantial threats, attacks, and vulnerabilities in real time.
The solution allows IT departments to process large volumes of data and prioritize incidents by severity. It automatically reacts to an incident and enforces compliance with requirements due to its ability to gather data, correlate it, and produce reports. A user may also run a predictive analysis for risks that already exist and have been caused by improper device setup or known vulnerabilities.
Challenges
The company’s QA testing process had already been streamlined and well-adjusted for quite a while. All tests had been covered by QA automation, and yet, after seven years, the customer felt the need to switch to a new platform; a platform that would meet all modernization requirements, improve the service provided by the company, and process data in a more secure and time-efficient manner.
The automation process that had been in place turned out to be incompatible with the new platform; it could not be integrated into the current process, either. It was these reasons underpinning the decision to construct a brand new automation process that would support present-day requirements and have the capacity to do so for years to come, based on projected growth.
Key Objectives
- Determination of suitable testing types and approaches in line with the customer’s requirements
- Setup of a manual testing process with a complete transition to automation in the future
- Selection of a tech stack for the creation of an automated testing user framework. This framework had to account for a complex system interacting with various third-party, highly secure services which combined API, database, and application tests
- Development of the test automation framework and test scenarios that would fully cover the system’s functionality
- Getting it all up and running
- Generation of reports.
Solutions
Our team started by carefully learning the old process, domain, automation infrastructure, and software testing environment. After that, we studied the new platform in order to fully comprehend the course of action we needed to take. We also analyzed multiple approaches to pick the one best informed by our own experience. Besides, we had to account for the customer’s requirements and tool limitations.
Be it dev testing or prod testing, in general, automated QA experts need to be fluent in manual testing, meaning they would know which approach to use and which test cases to put higher on a priorities list. Testing varies from project to project; sometimes, customers/manual testers/business analysts provide particular test cases for automation, but in our case, the client did not have a manual testing process per se.
Since the work went hand-in-hand with the migration to a new platform and not all services were automation-ready, we set up the manual testing process as an interim stage. That allowed us to analyze checks and determine which scenarios needed auto-test coverage. As the project moved forward, we started building a new framework for automation that would support all technologies and achieve maximum coverage.
Benefits for the Customer
We have already covered all the recent functionality and put manual testing into action. We have also formulated requirements for a new user framework and picked technologies for their implementation, meaning we’ll be able to ensure an all-out auto-test coverage and quit manual testing altogether. Thanks to the preparatory work we did, the customer will soon enjoy shorter time-to-market and lower costs.
General Recommendations
This project has demonstrated that our team is capable of locating spot-on solutions for projects with sophisticated business logic, integrating systems with a multitude of services, and executing various types of testing within a single framework to better write, launch, and analyze QA testing scenarios and retrieve their results. All these allow the customer to examine product quality at any given point.
To learn more, please read about the test automation services we provide and the JUNASE solution we came up with.