Original date: 26 Feb 2009, 1:00pm

Front-End Test Automation Practices – Record/Playback

1. Description
• Hard-coded data
• Hard-coded flow
• No error handling
• No or limited reporting
• No structure
• No verification
• No validation

2. Advantages
• Easy to create
• Quick to create
• No programming required

3. Disadvantages
• Very low usability
• Extremely high maintenance cost
• No-proof test results
• Break on any fail
• Poor test flow coverage
• A lot of manual work is still required

4. Applicability
• Demo and sale presentations
• Same day testing (re-record from scratch, short test flow)
• GUI Exploration (investigating how the Testing Tool handles the Application)
• Automated data entry (restrictions apply)