Parent page: Test Automation Problems

Software

 Technical problems related to Test Automation Tools, and platform-product-tool compatibilities.

Problems

• Test Automation Tool does not support Product’s platform (operating system) completely or partially
• Test Automation Tool does not support Product’s GUI (for Functional/Regression Test Automation) completely or partially (this may include total absence of support for the particular GUI or a need having installed specific add-ins)
• Test Automation Tool does not support Product’s Client/Server communication protocols (for non-GUI Load/Performance Testing)
• Test Automation Tool does not provide service functionalities required: powerful enough programming language, connection to external components, access to file system and database, etc.

Hardware

 Many companies have a standard office PC configuration that doesn’t completely meet automation requirements. And for Load/Performance Testing, network pipe and load server are the first things to consider.

Problems

• PC Performance. The most of Testing Tools have minimal configuration and recommended configuration requirements specified in the manuals. Should not even consider the first one. And make sure for automation development machine configuration exceeds recommended configuration, especially in RAM availability
• Network Performance. If you have Load Test requirement specifying response time from the application server try pinging (e.g. ping <ip-address>) it first. The numbers will give an idea whether the network is suitable for load traffic you’re going to generate. And consider running Load Generator and the Application Server at the same machine if it’s powerful enough

Access

 Technical problems related to number of licenses and distribution of licenses. Infrastructure – where test assets are located, how they are accessed and managed.

Points of consideration

• License distribution. Number of Test Environments and number of concurrently executable Test Plans should be assessed
• Test Automation and Automated Testing are separate activities having separate deliverables
• Test Data structure should be planned through to be unified
• The core source code of the framework should be shared across all the machines (but not duplicated through copy/paste!) and protected from accidental or unapproved changes in the same time. If number of contributing automation developers exceeds 2-3 persons then use of a source control tool should be considered