Looking for ways to increase your team’s productivity? Wondering if automated regression testing is the way to go? Or struggling to understand which tools and practices a tester must use for Regression Testing?
What is automated regression testing ?
Regression Testing is the process of verifying that the application hasn’t regressed (went back) to a previous undesired state, after undergoing changes. In other words, regression testing is used to ensure new changes to the code have not introduced new defects in functionality that were previously working.
Regression testing should ideally be performed every time a change is made in the application—be it by the introduction of a new feature, a bug fix, or an improvement.
When is regression testing usually conducted ?
After a code change. Why?
Because after adding a new feature or fixing a bug in a component, other parts of the system might get affected to the extent where it leads to some of the features not functioning properly. In order to make sure that this doesn’t happen, testers need to re-evaluate the functionality after every code change. If this step is skipped, bugs might go unnoticed and you may have unhappy customers.
That being said, re-testing the entire system every time a new feature is added or changes is a laborious task that takes time, money, and resources. So how do we make this easier and more efficient? The key to this lies in automation. This means that after a code change a series of pre-written test scripts will be executed, that require little to zero human supervision.
Why should you consider automated regression testing?
One of the main benefits of regression testing automation is, without any doubt, convenience. Besides, it saves time, helps you roll your shiny new features much faster and with confidence. And most of all, automatic regression testing saves a lot of money.
Regression tests need time if they are to be executed effectively and efficiently. Here are some of the pointers that developers need to look into for a comprehensive testing session:
➔ How a code change might impact other portions of the application.
➔ Analyze every aspect of the system.
➔ Monitor the project over a considerable period of time to catch those defects that take time to surface – memory leaks are a case in point.
➔ Recognize and fix the root cause of the problem.
Does your team need automated regression testing?
To help you answer this question, we have put down a quick checklist for you. Tick the points below to decide whether or not you need to implement this for your project.
Repeatability
Since automated tests are consistent and have predictable performance, they are highly repeatable. For companies that carry out frequent changes, manual regression testing is not an option. Automated regression tests can be run every time at the click of a button or integrated with CI/CD pipeline to be run automatically at every code build.
Stability
In the case of manual testing, the QA team has to rely on the expertise and skills of the specialists involved. The results are heavily dependent on the tester’s approach, level of knowledge, and concentration. But when you bring automation into the picture, this process removes human intervention and becomes more reliable. This also makes the level of expertise and focus consistent throughout all the system components.
No human supervision
For running automated tests, typically no human supervision is required. They run for hours on end and spit out the results for the team to review and fix. This saves QA teams a lot of bandwidth that can be utilized for other non-trivial workflows that haven’t been automated yet.
Increased coverage
With automated testing, QA engineers can run more tests and evaluate the system deeper and wider ie. Increased coverage, in a short span of time. This otherwise would have taken substantially more time if done manually.
Here are some of the automated regression testing tools that you can choose from
Now that you are clear on the role automated regression testing can play in improving your app’s performance and whether it’s the right fit for your strategy or not, let’s get into how you can implement it efficiently. Getting a comprehensive understanding of the kind of third-party automation tools that are available will help you with this.
From increasing the pace of writing scripts to improve the overall efficiency of the testing, there are lots of tools that are designed to help you perform automated regression testing.
Here’s a list of our favorites:
Selenium
An open-source tool for browser management, Selenium supports almost every browser and operating system. Popular scripting languages such as PHP, C++, Ruby, Java, Python, JS, C#, and Perl, are all supported. This tool also offers integrations with other frameworks for automated testing streamlining. Being a leading tool for automated testing, Selenium is the go-to choice for many QA specialists.
Main features:
● Command categorization by classes
● No server installation required
● Selenium Remote Control
● WebDriver API support
Appium
Appium tools have two versions — a Node. js-based tool run by the command line and is a desktop tool for Windows and Mac OS — both of which are used for mobile regression test automation.
The command-line-based version has an array of features and is way better than the desktop client. Appium Studio is extremely popular among QA specialists owing to its robust execution system that is tailor-made for the needs of mobile testing on a high level. It also has a code export feature that supports a host of programming languages.
Main features:
● Connection to remote and local mobile devices
● Visual interface
● Dynamic device reflection support
● Quick program installation
● Parallel execution support
● Recording tests
● Object spy
Bqurious Test Automation And Management Platform
Bqurious is an end-to-end no-code Test Automation and Management Platform. It allows you to leverage your Manual QA Engineers to write automated tests – spanning multiple technologies, Web, Mobile, API, SAP, etc.
A quick guide to getting started with automated regression testing
So here is how you should approach regression testing and integrating automation into your Test strategy:
- Software change analysis
A developer, at this stage, analyses the system component that will be changed and the extent of that change. - Software change impact analysis
Next, the possible implications of the code change need to be evaluated and outlined, along with identifying all the systems that a new feature or bug fix would impact. This will allow the team to figure the potential damage to the system and find the best ways of dealing with it. - Building a regression testing strategy
At this stage, the testing team should define the workflow, bringing every step into focus and breaking it down. This is how crafting a regression strategy could look like:
- Creating a test suite: First, the QA specialist will write tests that will be automated, and then the automation engineer will create scripts that can be executed, in a language that is selected by the team beforehand.
- Executing regression tests: Prioritizing cases and assessing the reusability of test modules while running automated tests is critical to the success of your strategy. It is also important to ensure that tests are run frequently and appropriate reporting mechanism is maintained.
- Reporting: The outcome of the testing needs to be explained to the stakeholders — like an end client or a project manager — by the QA specialists at this stage. The metrics of analysis, the scope of testing, and how the testing session enabled them to achieve the objectives also need to be elaborated on to write a strong and insightful summary report.
Some of the best practices that you can follow for better results and performance
It is imperative to have a defined set of practices that need to be followed during every session. With this, it can easily be understood whether regression testing covers every aspect of the system or not. It will also provide an objective and detailed report on the project’s functionality. The testing workflow should ideally entail these principles :
A regression pack should be regularly updated
A regression pack is a collection of all the tests that are run by a company when code is updated. Keeping this up-to-date is good for ensuring that a test suite corresponds well and fits with the new version of the app.
Re-run the successful test cases
One of the most common mistakes that teams often end up making is skipping to re-run tests that have done well and passed through successfully after a change is made. It needs to be kept in mind that a subsequent code change can affect the components of the system that were earlier working perfectly, which is why is it important to re-run all the tests, including the successful ones.
Highlight and focus on the paths with high traffic
Frequently visited pages/functionality need to be prioritized, before moving on to testing other aspects of the system. Also, make sure that there is complete clarity on the components that generate and augment core interactions and features.
Be data-driven to increase testing efficiency
Data can be the go-to superpower here — empowering your entire testing strategy in more ways than one. Relying on data helps developers create scripts using lesser code, store the gathered information as a database of records that can be managed, and enables them to eliminate redundancies. Data-driven tests also have more accurate insights.
Diversify the automation toolkit
This will increase the test coverage, allow you to use the chosen scripted language to the optimum capacity, and expand the range of testing opportunities. Now that we’ve got you covered on automated regression testing, what are you waiting for? Get started on your automation journey, today!