Automated Testing Is Competitively Necessary Today
Anyone familiar with technology understands the breakneck pace of the industry today. According to the modern reckoning of Moore’s Law, certain primary hardware aspects of technological capability double on themselves at eighteen month intervals. While certain other tech progression indicators have slowed down, Moore’s Law holds in regard to hardware.
Software additionally transitions quickly, and the advent of cloud computing has led to exceptional increase. What this ultimately means is that to remain relevant, companies producing software like mobile applications must use whatever cutting edge means of development exist to retain market competitiveness.
One process of development that can be complicated involves testing varying software, and for that, Agile development protocols are effectively supported by a few best practices—one of being automation. Automated testing tools get you necessary results more quickly, allowing you to refine operations nigh-continuously. For best results, follow these three steps.
1. Know The Parameters Of Your Project
If you’re designing an application that is designed to expand users on a predictable curve, then you’ll have parameters that accordingly shift. For whatever automated tools you’re considering, it’s important to understand the parameters within which they’ll be operating. You want the most relevant data that you can acquire in this area.
Find methods of detailing every step of your development project. Be sure you involve all developers working on the project to get the most accurate perspective of what is necessary. When you know the parameters, you’ll know where to focus testing tools.
2. Determine KPIs You Can Use As Effectiveness Indicators
Key Performance Indicators are sort of a “bottleneck” statistic which describes a large quotient of an application’s operation. KPIs can also be used in other areas of operation, such as sales or marketing outreach. In terms of application development, KPIs might pertain to the speed certain functions load, or how fast files may download for further use.
Different software will have different KPIs. While the “parameters” of your project define exterior conditions of development, it may be helpful to think of KPIs as interior aspects of development. Automated tools should have the ability to monitor KPIs as continuously as feasible for the most balanced and dependable results.
KPIs can also be used to help you gauge the effectiveness of varying tools, also. That is to say: you should expect automation options to reduce a certain amount of operational “static” in terms of cost. If the tools you’re using aren’t giving you results outpacing non-automated tactics, then it’s probably time to look into some more effective tools.
3. Select Automated Solutions That Are Appropriately User-Friendly
User-friendliness is a big consideration here. Different users will have different needs, but if you give your development team tools which are only really navigable by their designers, that’s going to undermine the effectiveness of the software products you’re putting together. Finding relevant information and taking appropriate action should be as simple as possible.
There are a number of different solutions out there, and some remarkable logging protocols that can save you a lot of development difficulties. You can automatically keep information on errors, exceptions, and other prescient operational issues using a log aggregator like that available from Papertrail.
Part of understanding project parameters externally and internally will involve taking the team managing development into account. Granted, there are basic thresholds that you should be expecting your personnel to reach on a regular basis. However, there’s no reason to make things difficult unnecessarily.
If you’re choosing between two similarly effective automated solutions, a very worthwhile determining factor is going to be user-friendliness. Personnel are your best and most costly asset. If their work is easier, they get more done quicker, conserving operational resources.
Expediting The Design Process
A collateral advantage of automation is increased speed in production. The more effectively you automate, the more quickly you can produce. Think of it like a pyramid structure that decreases in complexity from a wide base to a knife-edge point at the top. The wide base is the slow initial development, and the point is nigh-instantaneous automated output.
As you learn parameters, establish accurate KPIs, and find user-friendly automation tools, you’ll climb that pyramid toward efficiency with increasing speed. This will be competitively necessary as peers in your field make the automated switch. If you aren’t as automated as you can be, in terms of balance, this is something to strive for.
