supriya – Talent500 Blog

Manual testing guide: Types, myths & tools

Posted on October 31, 2022November 8, 2022 by supriya

Software development is more than just writing lines of code. There’s planning, strategizing, development, DevOps, and at the final stage, testing. Two approaches can be taken for software testing – manual and automated.

In most projects, you must skillfully combine manual and automated testing for the most comprehensive testing. However, both approaches are not entirely interchangeable and have significant differences.

This article covers only manual testing in detail; you can read more about automation testing here. Let’s start from the beginning.

What is manual testing?

Manual testing is an approach that evaluates the performance of software and examines its features from the end-user perspective to assess its quality. It is much more intensive QA testing as it involves human testers closely monitoring the code quality, identifying existing defects, and anticipating any possible weaknesses.

The profound impact of manual testing results from its four-stage process.

A manual testing project starts with a requirement study that involves testers getting acquainted with quality assurance requirements. QA engineers understand the software’s needs, objectives, operating principles, main features and functions, and possible vulnerabilities at this stage.

The next step is to design test cases to examine all possible use cases of the software. Testers can use Excel sheets to document their test cases, but if the project is large, it is not the most efficient way. There are efficient case management tools for manual testers like Kissflow, Appian, and Alfresco that can help them document test cases and automate the workflow.

Testing and bug reporting follow the test case design. Manual testers create the environment to live test the software. They continuously log bugs that they come across using a bug-tracking system.

The final step is the analysis of manual testing results. Here, the aim is to generate valuable metrics to help developers fix defects and bugs.

When to use manual testing?

Some people believe that test automation is a replacement for manual testers. QA engineers understand that manual testing is indispensable for several reasons.

1. Certain tests can only be successful manually

For instance, user experience testing during quality assurance cannot be complete without manual testing. You can automate the UX/UI testing workflow, but only a human can adequately perform tasks like an end user. Compatibility and interactions are essential for mobile devices, and any app, if deployed without manual testing, risks being buggy.

2. Large software almost always has hidden bugs

Automated testing might be able to discover most bugs testing a small-scale software product, but when things go to the enterprise level, it is impossible to detect hidden bugs. Machines can be programmed to test for specific bugs. But manual testers run into hidden bugs during their routine tasks. Automation testing can never detect such defects.

3. When budget is a constraint

Automated testing can be expensive. If your budget is low, you do not want to spend your initial investments on testing the product before it can hit the market. Due to its low maintenance expenses, manual testing is a more suitable option here.

4. Automation often falls behind sprints

Maintaining automated test cases is no easy job. You have to update the scripts for performance and validity continuously. It is difficult for automated testing to keep up with frequent software update releases. Manual testing can manage to be in sync with sprints.

5. Repetition and variability

Any effective QA testing will have two characteristics – repetition and variability. Automated testing is excellent for repetitive testing processes, but that’s not enough. Without manual testing, you cannot introduce variability in the process. This is why automation is often combined with manual testing.

Common myths surrounding manual testing

As a manual tester, you might often hear these myths:

Manual testing is easy: If you think anyone can do manual testing, then you are misinformed. It requires skills and a certain mindset to be a successful manual tester.
Automation will replace manual testing: Again, it’s impossible to simulate human interaction with the software entirely. Manual testers will always remain relevant.
QA engineers are only involved in the post-development stage: Companies with successful products know that testers must work simultaneously with developers to catch bugs early on. Including testers in the final step is a risky venture.

Best tools for manual testing

Depending on the stage at which you are conducting the manual testing, you can pick from these tools:

For case management: Kissflow, Appian, Alfresco

For bug tracking: Jira, Bugzilla, Trello

For cross-browser testing: BrowserStack, Sauce Labs

Screen capture tools: Loom, Skitch, CloudApp

Conclusion

Manual testing remains an essential aspect of successful software products. As software becomes more user-oriented, manual testers are becoming increasingly important in guiding the efficiency of automated testing.

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Best web automation tools for QA in 2022

Posted on October 31, 2022November 8, 2022 by supriya

Web automation tools are great for the quality testing of web and mobile products. While manual testing is more rigorous and profound, it’s not always a cost-effective solution for testing applications. That is why development teams widely adopt QA automation which allows them to create low-code or scriptless test cases. Another benefit of automation is that it helps facilitate continuous testing throughout the software development life-cycle, which results in faster and leaner development. QA tools are essential for any software development team.

For this article, our expert QA testers handpicked the best web automation tools for quality assurance in 2022.

1. BrowserStack

BrowserStack is a cloud-based QA automation tool that allows QA engineers to conduct comprehensive web and mobile testing. Many teams use this tool to verify the cross-browser compatibility of their applications to ensure they offer a unified user experience. You can test your applications’ functionality, performance, and visual appeal using BrowserStack.

To further its implementation, the developers of this tool offer Percy, an automated visual testing product that developers can integrate into their CI/CD pipelines. Visual testing in modern application development is essential as it allows QA engineers to identify visual regressions before impacting end users. With Percy, you can capture screenshots and make a pixel-by-pixel comparison of the application’s UI baseline to recognize any defects quickly.

Development teams can integrate BrowserStack with some of the most popular automation frameworks like Espresso and Appium. It also connects to popular CI/CD tools like Bamboo and Jenkins.

2. testRigor

testRigor is a QA automation tool for functional UI regression and exploratory testing. One of the most robust QA tools, it relies on artificial intelligence to autonomously generate test cases by predicting end-user behavior. If you are looking for a low-maintenance testing tool, testRigor offers unmatched efficiency. QA engineers can write test cases in plain English, reducing testing phase time significantly. It is also available as the Chrome browser extension to record your tests. You can register yourself using an application, and this QA automation tool will generate a test case based on the recording. There is no coding or dependency on XPath, so the test cases are highly stable and easy to maintain. You can integrate testRigor with TestRail, Git, Azure DevOps, and Jenkins.

3. Autify

Another AI-powered QA automation tool, Autify, supports no-code testing of web and mobile applications. The tool lets QA engineers create test scenarios by emulating the use of the application as a user. Due to its no-code, intuitive UI, some of the largest tech companies like Unity, DeNA, Radar, and Globis use Autify for testing their applications.

Autify offers parallel execution, visual regression testing, and Shadow DOM elements. One of this testing tool’s unique features is that it can run up to 10 cross-browser tests simultaneously. The AI used in this tool automatically monitors the app UI for any changes, and if detected, the test scenarios are accordingly updated. As for integration, your team can use Autify with Jenkins, Webhook, TestRail, CircleCI, and Slack.

4. Katalon Studio

Katalan Studio is a comprehensive QA automation testing tool that you can use for APIs, web interfaces, mobile platforms, and Windows desktop applications. It is primarily designed as a functional testing tool for QA engineers to create and reuse automated test scenarios for UI elements like iFrames and pop-ups without coding. One of the distinguishing features of Katalan Studio is that it is available for any stakeholder in your team, irrespective of their programming skills. Its dual editor interface allows non-technical users to create test scenarios using the straightforward UI that does not require coding. While for advanced programmers, there is another interface to write test scripts with syntax highlighting, debugging, and code suggestions.

You can use this QA automation tool on any operating system, including Windows, Linux, and Mac OS. It is also compatible with the most commonly used continuous testing tools like Git, Jenkins, Jira, and Docker integrations.

5. IBM Rational Functional Tester (RFT)

The association with a well-known brand is not the only USP of IBM Rational Functional Tester. It is a web automation tool written purely in Java and is one of the best QA automation tools for teams that develop their products in Java, .Net, or C#.

IBM Rational Functional Tester is a serious testing tool that allows you to write test cases for manual and automated testing. It is a quality assurance tool that you can use for enterprise applications. Like other QA automation tools on the list, it also allows test visualization and editing using rendered screenshots. It provides intelligent script maintenance capabilities to enable straightforward functional and regression testing automation. Development teams can use this QA testing tool with other platforms like Jenkins, Apache Maven, and QuickTest.

Conclusion

As important as the code quality of an application is, quality assurance is no less. We hope the QA automation tools listed here will help you create comprehensive testing scenarios to launch high-quality products.

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Best practices for speeding up code reviews

Posted on October 10, 2022November 10, 2022 by supriya

Code review is a natural process of software development. It is required to ensure the quality of the code and functionality of the final product. But for software engineers, it is often a painful experience as reviews can be extremely slow, causing delays and switching between tasks. For developers, code reviews can be extremely frustrating, especially when the reviewer is nitpicking or bikeshedding.

Software development teams employ several tactics to correct this problem. While smaller groups working on small-scale projects can eliminate the code review process, it is not an option for enterprise-level companies. Rather than removing pull requests and code reviews altogether, you can improve the experience for both developers and code reviewers by adopting some best practices.

This article will explore some best practices for speeding up code reviews.

Keep pull requests small

One of the biggest reasons developers dread reviewing pull requests is the high quantity of changes in the code base. When there are 1000+ lines of code changes, reviewing these changes can take hours or even days. Often, a reviewer skims through the code rather than carefully reviewing the changes. As a result, the quality of the code is compromised.

Keeping pull requests small is an excellent idea to have high review quality. When a small number of changes are to be reviewed, engineers do not have to spend too much time creating a mental map of how these changes interact with the code. Less number of changes means fewer errors and comments. The reviewer doesn’t have to run to the author often when pull requests are kept smaller.

Keeping the pull requests small can seem daunting if you are not efficiently breaking down your work into smaller tasks. Try to segregate tasks such as separate re-factoring from new features or bug fixes. You can also use feature flags in your code to directly merge small changes into the main branch of the code without showing up in the production app.

Implement Response Time SLAs

The code review cycle becomes inefficient when pull requests are regularly unreviewed for long durations. You must set clear expectations for how quickly a new pull request should be reviewed. What is the maximum time your team allows a code review request to stay pending? Is it an hour? or 24 hours? Two days?

The answer most likely depends on the size of your team, but the best practice for code review is to establish a precise, responsive time SLA (service level agreement). An SLA usually refers to how quickly our response is given when a technical issue is raised. There should be the right balance in deciding response time SLA.

You cannot expect the code reviewers to attend to your new pull requests immediately and drop whatever they are doing. At the same time, it is detrimental to wait for hours to get the changes reviewed. The right approach is to set a regular response time SLA for pull request reviews. For instance, your team can establish a three-hour response time SLA for internal team code reviews and a 24-hour response time SLA for external pull requests.

The right balance of response time SLA puts your team in a flow state where every developer can work on the report and review pull requests throughout the day without affecting their productivity.

Set up continuous integration pipelines

If code reviewers have to go through minimal changes such as comments like “Missing Semicolon” or “Incorrect Indentation”, it will be highly tedious for them to complete the review. Ensure that developers are not spending time on issues that code formatters and code linters can easily take care of. Several tools are available to ensure that code is formatted correctly so developers can focus on essential things.

For example, suppose you are working on a JavaScript project. In that case, you can configure a formatter like Prettier and a linter like ESLint low to automatically format the code in your repo. Additionally, you can set up continuous integration for the repo using tools like Travis CI and GitHub Actions. This CI pipeline will run the formatting and linting task when you’re unit testing. The CI pipeline will block the pull request from merging with the main branch if the pipeline fails at any step.

This approach can automate several essential parts of the code review process, saving hours.

Train junior and mid-level engineers

One way to improve the capability of your team to conduct quick and effective code reviews is to teach less experienced engineers. During a code review, help junior and mid-level engineers understand what’s important and what’s not. Teach them the grammar of code review comments to communicate efficiently. You can also take references from Google’s Code Review Developer Guide, an excellent guide for code authors and reviewers.

Conclusion

Code review is an integral part of the software development lifecycle, but in the absence of optimization, it can result in unwarranted delays. We hope these steps will help you streamline the code review process.

To learn more, refer to the guide on understanding and improving code quality from Talent500. We are a platform for software engineers to find career re-defining opportunities with global companies. Join us here.

4 key principles of test automation

Posted on September 28, 2022 by supriya

Testing is an integral part of the software development lifecycle. No software can be deployed without thorough tests. Quality Assurance or QA testing is essential in software development to ensure that the code performs the function it is supposed to.

Tests can be manual or automated in software engineering. Manual testing is a resource-intensive approach that demands QA testers to create test cases or even deliberately introduce bugs in the code to evaluate the effect. It’s similar to crash testing in the automobile industry. Manual software testing is complicated and expensive, so it is often reserved for the end of the production cycle. However, testing a product at the end of production can delay the product launch by months.

A better alternative is automated software testing that allows developers to run tests as often as they want without exerting high costs. The initial investment in automation testing is writing test automation cases. There are several benefits of test automation apart from frequent testing. It gives developers continuous feedback to spot bugs and errors early on. Automated software testing improves design, code quality, and timely launches.

Principles of test automation

Test automation can be achieved in several ways, but developers must understand a few fundamental underlying principles. Familiarity with these key test automation principles will make you a better QA tester.

Entire books have been written exclusively on the topic of test automation. It’s a skill every developer needs to master at some point, and it’s better to do it sooner rather than later.

1. Test automation improves the quality

Code quality is paramount and signifies a product that can be trusted. Several metrics measure code quality in the software industry, including code coverage, number of defects, CI error rate, readability, maintainability, and test failure. Still, none of these can completely define code test quality and only provide an idea about some aspect of the code.

Test automation must improve quality. It is the primary principle of designing automated test cases. With every iteration, tests must be able to find defects before they can reach production, inform developers of underlying loopholes, and check any deviations in the system behaviour. Successful test cases show a high-level view of a project, allowing developers to try different approaches for the same functionality to find the one that works best.

2. QA testing reduces risk

Human reviewers cannot find every error within the code, no matter how many eyes go through the same code. Code review is necessary and productive, but it must be reliable too.

Another essential principle of test automation is that it reliably finds errors. Automate test cases and check the code from top to bottom comprehensively. By progressively running tests to find errors and bugs, find regressions, and check device and environment compatibility, you can bring down the risks and cost through test automation. QA testing is mandatory to ensure no risks or discrepancies exist in the code, even when the most proficient developers work on a project. Programmers might not make a mistake, but using third-party dependencies did not introduce any errors or pose a risk to the integrity of the application. Test automation can evaluate every line of code to ensure no risk.

3. Be mindful of subtle design changes that test scripts can miss

When writing test case scripts, QA engineers often focus on testing the new functionality implemented in the software but overlook the design changes. For test automation, while creating test scripts, you must proactively anticipate any design changes that might result from code changes. For instance, an update of the application code can improve its functionality. However, it can introduce colour changes in the interface that test scripts might not check if you have not included a condition to review display changes. While not a critical error, it indicates that the test automation is not entirely reliable.

4. Test automation should require low maintenance

Developers are focused on writing concise code to create products that deliver excellent customer experience and perform as expected. Test automation ensures they can work on writing code rather than fretting over repeated testing. As a QA tester, you should focus on writing test scripts that are easy to execute and maintain.

Any reliable and practical test suite will require periodic maintenance to keep it in good shape for repeated use. Here are a few tips for writing and maintaining test cases:

Tests should be enough to be effective, not more. If you notice that with a small change, test cases are breaking, you might be using too many tests and need to remove a few.

Choose the proper test depending on the situation. For instance, unit tests are laser-focused and can be deployed faster, while UI tests are comprehensive and use a lot more resources. Healthy test automation follows the test pyramid approach.

Keep tests reliable and avoid flaky tests; otherwise, your test suite can waste time and create frustration. Flaky tests fail even when the code is correct or show an error for no apparent reason.

Conclusion

Developers who think precise testing is expensive are unaware of the cost of poorly tested code. Bugs and defects in a product can quickly spiral out of control, and practical test automation is the only way to ensure it never happens. QA engineers should consider the top QA testing trends when writing test cases.

Are you looking for QA testing opportunities? Join Talent500, where you will find opportunities with fast-growing startups and Fortune 500 companies.

Necessary QA testing checklists

Posted on September 28, 2022September 28, 2022 by supriya

QA testing is essential for releasing higher-quality products, but it also ensures that the skills and resources at an organization are reliable. With successful QA testing, software development teams can ensure that they are creating products best to their potential.

A comprehensive quality assurance process has not only technical aspects but also a balance between the communication and workflows of both internal and external teams. We have created this QA testing checklist to help you with the entire QA testing process.

1. Project scope review

Every QA testing project begins with a comprehensive internal assessment of the scope and requirements of the QA process. Before starting, you must know the project parameters critical for quality assurance. Usually, you must know what elements of the testing can be automated and cannot be automated, the languages, platforms, and devices that the application needs to be tested for, and the role of each QA tester. The aim here is to properly evaluate the requirements of the QA testing and its scope to ensure it offers the maximum ROI. Project scope review also lets you anticipate the collaborative efforts needed for transparent communication.

2. Resource planning meet

QA testers, development engineers, and other stakeholders must know the testing phase’s purpose, needs, requirements, and execution plan. At this stage, you decide what test frameworks, tools, and types of QA testing will be implemented. Furthermore, the communication protocols between the internal and external teams are established during the kick-off meeting.

The balance between automated and manual testing is also determined at this step. You decide how these tests will be deployed and which component or segment of the software will be tested. When all the stakeholders agree to the shared set of metrics, you can move to the next stage, the framework design for QA testing.

3. Framework design

As a QA tester, you must have the expertise and skills to anticipate the test requirements. You will be responsible for not only selecting the tools and technologies but also designing the use scenarios and reporting processes to create a framework based on the specific requirement of the product to be tested.

The framework you will design must consider the development environment. Some critical questions to ask at this step are:

Whether you will employ a keyword-driven, data-driven, behavior-driven, or modular test framework for QA testing?
How much of the framework will be dedicated to automated testing?
How frequently will you run automated tests?
What kind of reporting mechanism will the framework utilize?
What extent of involvement will be required from developers, engineers, and other stakeholders?

Your QA testing framework architecture must address all these questions to be effective.

4. Selecting the right tools

QA test cases are designed depending on the technologies that are used to build an application and the complexity of the design. The right tools for QA testing for a particular product depend on these factors. QA engineers are tasked with selecting the right tools from the range of open-source and paid testing tools available on the market.

QA testers must pick the tools that best suit an application for the QA process to be effective. Any tool you select must have a balance of:

Platform compatibility
Versatility
Ease of maintenance
Automation scope
QA test report generation

Also, you must measure the tool’s value against the cost of licensing and support. It will help you keep the QA testing budget under check. For an efficient software testing process, test cases and defects management tools must be selected after thorough research.

5. Types of QA testing

With multiple QA testing types available, you have to select the one that tests the given software product at the highest standards. One of the dominant software testing methodologies is Agile QA testing, which requires more than one specialized QA tester to work on the testing project to produce efficiency in the process. Among the available options for QA testing, you have to choose one or more of these options:

Manual testing: It requires a human tester who emulates the role of the end-user
Automation testing: It dominantly uses test scripts that automate manual testing. Automation testing is much faster.
API testing: It is aimed at testing the functionality and reliability of programming interfaces

Learn more about QA testing trends and types here.

These three tests carry the bulk of the QA testing role. But, in some cases, you may also have to include security, performance, and accessibility testing.

Conclusion

We are sure that this QA testing checklist will assist you at every step, from initial internal planning to the final stages of test execution. As a QA tester, you must keep this checklist handy to ensure the quicker release of software products.

Talent500 is the platform that Fortune 500 companies and global startups use to build their agile QA testing teams. Join our elite pool of QA testers by signing up here.

What is the future of manual testing?

Posted on September 19, 2022September 22, 2022 by supriya

The software testing community is not new to controversial questions like whether manual testing is dying. If you are a manual tester, we can understand how such speculative queries trigger panic. Mass adoption by companies doesn’t help the cause and makes you feel like automatic testing is the next big thing.

Pause for a moment and think about it:

Is it possible to create a reliable, 100% automated testing environment?

Is it wise for a company to phase out manual testing?

And, above all, is it wise for software testers to start giving up their skills as a tester to adopt automatic tools?

The answer is no for all the above queries. Manual testing provides a tremendous amount of value to software development.

In this article, we explore the future of manual testing.

Understanding manual testing

Manual testing is the preliminary testing phase that’s closest to software development. It evaluates the behavior of the website or application developed through a step-by-step assessment based on the requirement specification analysis record. The core objective of manual testing is to ensure that the product works as per the requirement specification documents and that no bugs or functional defects exist.

Reasons why manual testing will always be needed

Manual testing is a preferred choice in several scenarios. Let’s look at areas where automation is not an option, and manual testers are better suited.

Smaller projects: Constructing and deploying automated testing systems is resource intensive. The overhead of automated testing is much higher than manual testing. Therefore, manual testing is the only economically feasible option for smaller projects.
Automation is expensive: We already covered how automated testing is not feasible for smaller projects, but for small organizations with budget constraints, it might not be an option even for larger projects. Manual testing offers an alternative to escape automated test methods’ high expenses and maintenance costs.
User experience: A machine can never fully emulate human behavior. This is why for user experience testing; we need manual testers who can imitate such behaviors and analyze the software product according to the needs and requirements of the end users. Manual testing will always be needed for higher UX. Unless we invest in a highly trained AI solution, such a level of user experience testing is impossible with automation.
Comprehensive and detailed testing: In automated testing, we have fixed and predetermined procedures that evaluate the software’s functioning and behavior according to preset rules. While the process is much quicker, the absence of any customization can result in minute defects getting ignored. As an additional layer of security, manual testing is required to remove any such bugs.

What does the future hold?

The modification and operational developments in manual testing are bringing it closer to software development. The future holds promising outcomes for manual testers, provided they keep improving their skills and learning new technologies.

Many companies and start-ups are asking QA questions to developers during interviews. A new expectation is rising within the industry where developers are expected to know a few things about manual testing. As agile becomes standard practice, the partition between developer and QA roles is blurring, and manual testers should understand development concepts like sorting algorithms. At the same time, developers who are familiar with the unit and functional testing are preferred.

Hence, manual testers will always be needed because it is impossible to release bug-free software without the intervention of human eyes. Once teams start to scale, the model of zero testers starts failing, throwing light on the fact that 100% automation of software testing is not possible for sustainability.

Automation can augment manual testing

Some aspects of manual testing are augmented with automation to improve the efficiency of testing large applications. Foremost, any repetitive steps within the testing process that does not require manual expertise can be automated. It saves human resources, time, and energy. Aiding manual testers with artificial intelligence helps reduce human errors. Adding automation can help manual testers become more reliable. Another segment where automation can augment manual testing is when evaluating complex code. Manual testers may not be as effective and efficient in such scenarios as reliably scripted automated test cases.

Conclusion

Manual testing offers the needed accuracy, intuitiveness, and micro control over every aspect of software testing. Quoting manual testing has no future will be an uninformed assertion. Both manual testing and automated testing have merits. Without a doubt, manual testing can never be replaced, and for maximum ROI, QA testers must balance manual and automated testing.

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Top 4 tips for beginner QA engineers

Posted on July 15, 2022July 15, 2022 by supriya

Quality Assurance engineers play an essential role in the overall development of software. Quality assurance is a crucial step in software development, given the rise of cybersecurity threats and increasing demand for more efficient software.

It is easy to understand why organizations hire QA engineers to test a product beforehand. Quality assurance engineers are responsible for designing test cases that evaluate the performance and security of the software built. It is part of their job to match the requirements of the software with the final product and detect any minute or significant errors that can compromise the integrity of the final product.

As you are here, it is safe to assume that you have just started your career as a QA engineer. We are sure you already have the crucial skills, and here we focus more on QA engineer tips that will make you a better tester.

Start with understanding different software development life cycles

You must have heard of the software life cycle as a beginner QA engineer. It refers to all the phases a software product goes through its development, i.e., planning, defining, designing, development, testing, deployment, and maintenance. As a QA engineer, your role will be necessary during the testing and maintenance.

However, you must be aware of all the phases, as your quality assurance inputs can help improve the entire process, not just the testing phase.

Software Development Life Cycle is a concept that explains the underlying infrastructure of a product. QA engineers aware of SDLC concepts are better at understanding the design of a software.

Apart from SDLC, QA engineers must also understand the testing life cycle used for designing test processes and bug life cycle, which specifies the process a tester should take when they find a bug. For a QA engineer, it is essential to know all three life cycles.

It is essential to know the types of bugs

As a beginner QA engineer, you will find it hard to identify bugs, which can be frustrating sometimes. However, decades of hard work of other QA engineers have helped professionals record specific types of parts you need to know so you can report and resolve them better. It will be vital for your career to understand the bugs.

Any aspect of software development – functionality, design, responsiveness, performance, syntax, and many more – can result in bugs that you will have to troubleshoot. The more you learn about the bugs, the easier it will get to do your job. In software engineering, bugs are commonly classified into three categories:

Software defects by nature
Software defects by severity
Software defects by priority

You can learn more about these defects here.

Learn to bug report comprehensively

Read this tip carefully, as it will serve you well throughout your software testing career.

Finding bugs is one thing; reporting them is an entirely distinct domain. To report bugs effectively, you will not only need technical skills but communication skills as well. QA engineers report the bug to the programmer to fix the issue. If the tester is not saying the bug correctly, the programmer will most likely reject the bug stating it as irreproducible.

Creating bug reports is not just a matter of semantics but requires comprehensive communication skills. You must be as thorough and detailed as possible in the reports to leave little or no scope for guesswork for the developers. Apart from the title and descriptions, you must include a video or image that clearly shows the issue. Here is a guide to learning how to create better bug reports.

Learn basics of UI elements

As you read through this QA engineer tip, you will realize that as a test, you will be put in front of the software to test its interface for bugs and errors. In modern-day software development, UI testing is an inevitable phase. Your job will become much easier as a QA engineer if you have a basic grasp of UI elements and frontend concepts.

It would help to familiarize yourself with frontend technologies like HTML, CSS, and Bootstrap. Also, learn about designing concepts such as typography, color wheel, and navigation. These concepts will help you test software in-depth on the backend and frontend.

Conclusion

The top 4 QA engineer tips are to produce efficient and impactful software testing results. Quality Assurance is an organized work requiring testers to have a precise understanding of the software development life cycle and adequate information about bugs. We hope these tips will help beginner QA engineers to deliver the best testing results.

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Selenium developer toolkit: In-demand skills, learning resources, interview prep & more

Posted on July 15, 2022 by supriya

An essential part of web development is testing. Countless hours are spent on testing a web app to make sure it is functional and secured. Previously, companies had to hire several manual testers to create test cases for every possible browser scenario to benchmark the performance and integrity of an application. Selenium came as a significant improvement creating tremendous scope for automating the testing process. QA engineers can enact and reenact hundreds of test cases speeding up the development and deployment of applications.

For Selenium developers, a lack of proper resources can prevent them from upskilling, or sometimes, the start can be overwhelming for beginners. Whether you are a manual tester exploring options in automation testing or a Selenium developer looking for upskilling resources, this toolkit will serve as the ultimate resource guide for both.

DevOps and Agile Methodology: Selenium developers must be trained in agile and DevOps methodology. As Agile help accelerate the design and execution of test projects, it is a skill that companies expect in competent QA engineers. DevOps skills enable multiple teams (development, design, analysis, and QA) to work in sync that help build a high-quality product. A Selenium developer should be able to utilize both these methodologies to boost their collaborative competencies.
Automation: Selenium is for automation. Companies expect Selenium developers to demonstrate the right automation skills, apart from Selenium, knowledge of technologies like HP-UTF, SoapUI, and Appium. These automation skills enable testers to design test cases that effectively evaluate the functionality of today’s complex and hyper-interactive applications.
Learn about new technologies: For Selenium developers, it is essential to be familiar with web and mobile technologies. To know the best ways to test any application, it is necessary to understand its underlying technology, the type of application, and its scope in terms of scalability. As development keeps evolving rapidly, it is essential to stay informed about updates and new features. It is why a tester should keep learning to understand better the coding architecture that goes into building effective QA solutions.
Testing tools and techniques: It is an obligatory Selenium tester skill to know different testing tools and techniques. Your expertise as a competent QA engineer comes from exploiting the features of testing tools to the fullest. Several methods include black-box testing, penetration testing, unit testing, system testing, and security testing. Knowing several testing techniques makes you a versatile tester. It is something companies look for, as versatility gives testers flexibility to work on any project. As for tools, Selenium developers much be familiar with tracking tools like Raygun, Sentry, and Bugsnag, GUI testing tools such as Katalon Studio, TestComplete, and Rapise, and test management tools like Jira, Zephyr Scale, and TestRail.
Rational analysis & logical thinking: Approaching testing challenges with a practical approach will require Selenium developers to save time and resources. While not an essential skill, it helps with project planning as with analytical and logical skills, testers can determine the method and strategy for a project way ahead. The rational analysis enables testers to validate applications against different scenarios and predefined standards.

15 Basic Interview Questions Every Selenium Automation Tester Must Know

7 Tricky Interview Questions An Experienced Selenium Automation Tester Should Know

Top 31 Selenium Interview Questions and Answers for 2022

Top 30 Mobile Testing Interview Questions and Answers

Top QA testing trends in 2022

Important Selenium coding tests for developers

Automation testing trends to look out for in 2022

How to communicate with the dev team as a QA engineer

Official Selenium Documentation

Selenium Project Guide

Selenium Official Blog

Selenium Slack Channel

Selenium IRC Chat

Selenium GitHub Repository

Online Courses & Tutorials

Learning Selenium from LinkedIn Learning: This course is a Selenium online training program for beginners to learn the basics of automation testing. The course covers everything from Selenium installation to WebDriver setup, Selenium Grid, and test-writing framework.

Selenium WebDriver with Java -Basics to Advanced+Frameworks from Udemy: For experienced Selenium developers, this course offers several learning topics. It includes real-time Selenium test cases with over 100 examples and comprehensive information on Maven, Jennings, Log4j, and API, Mobile Testing, Database Testing, and Cloud Automation with Sauce labs.

Automated Web Testing with Selenium and WebDriver Using Java from PluralSight: This is the ideal online course for you if you are a Java developer exploring Selenium. It is one of the best automation testing courses on PluralSight that teaches a record-and-playback approach via Selenium, WebDriver test cases, and how to build test suites. If you plan to develop a Quality Assurance framework for your projects, this course can guide you in the right direction.

Selenium WebDriver Masterclass with C# from Udemy: For Selenium developers who work with C#, this Udemy course will be an excellent resource. It will teach you how to create a Selenium WebDriver framework using C#, do parallel tests using NUnit, create HTML reports, test best practices such as DRY and SRP, Page Object Pattern, and automation testing.

Books for Selenium developers

The Selenium Guidebook: It is an essential resource for learning the basics of programming needed for automated testing. All topics necessary for automated testing, like how to decompose an existing web app, how to pack things into a test harness, and how to write reliable and maintainable tests, are covered. The book uses both Java and Ruby examples for exercises.

Selenium 2 Testing Tools: A thorough resource for Selenium developers to learn Selenium 2. The book teaches Selenium testing from top to bottom using Java.

Selenium Testing Tools Cookbook: This excellent book on Selenium tools is for more advanced learners. This is the right book if you want to learn a pragmatic approach to automation testing leveraging Selenium tools.

Online communities for Selenium developers

Podcasts for Selenium developers

TestGuild Automation Podcast

TestGuild Performance Testing Podcast

TestGuild Security Testing Podcast

AB Testing

Test & Code: Python Testing

Communication Skill: As for any other job, software testing roles also require good communication skills. Software testers must comprehend the requirements of a project and express their condition effectively. It will be a routine task for you to converse with software developers and other stakeholders. Excellent written and verbal skills are essential to dealing with discipline and diplomacy when part of a team.
Organizational management skills: Software testing involves many tasks, from designing test cases to validating each functionality. Selenium developers should be prolific schedule makers who can organize tasks and manage time skillfully. The organization management skills help testers efficiently plan and distribute the workload.
Attitude and passion: Right attitude is mandatory for a software testing job. Ability to deal with unforeseen challenges, being unique in designing test cases, and leading teams all require character and passion. If you are not passionate about your work, you can’t break the ceiling to progress and grow.

Conclusion

This is the ultimate Selenium developer toolkit to help you upskill and learn more about Selenium automation testing. We handpicked only the best resources so you can keep learning and be job-ready.

Talent500 is the platform for Indian IT talent to find career redefining opportunities. Fortune 500 companies and startups trust us to build their teams. Join our platform today!

3 Useful tips for back end debugging

Posted on April 30, 2022 by supriya

Creating software is the easy part; debugging is the tricky bit. According to most estimations, we can say that developers spend 35-50% of their time debugging and validating software.

Debugging skills are essential for backend developers, but they are challenging to develop. Why? While you can take academic courses to learn application design, syntax, and programming languages, when it comes to defect-finding skills, the closest skill you can acquire is knowledge of debugging tools like Chrome DevTools, WebStorm, and Node.js Inspector. Interestingly, when even up to 57-70% of the total budget of a software development project is spent on debugging, testing and verification, there is no formal internship to learn debugging. As a backend developer, you learn it on your own. And with experience, you optimize your approach to spend more time innovating and writing code and less time fixing bugs.

Finding the bug

What’s debugging? Is it adding or deleting code? Or is it logging all the errors? Well, interestingly, none of these are pre-requisites for competent debugging skills. It has everything to do with your thinking. Rather than typing, you have to analyze your code and think about what went wrong.

The old-school mind mapping technique requires you to create a hypothesis of what might be wrong with the code, which is the easiest way to find bugs. It would help if you tried to narrow down the bug as much as possible by changing inputs like file sizes and user inputs, using different browsers, and commenting on the parts of the code. While testing your hypothesis, you start with the most probable reason first.

It will help you find the bug’s location quickly. If you doubt the site, you can divide and conquer. The approach here is to divide the codebase in half and go through logs to see if the bug is in the first half or second. Then divide the problematic part into two halves, and repeat until you locate the bug in a few lines of code.

Expand your tech stack wisely

Tech stacks are a good starting point to get projects up and running, but do you always need the full stack to build an application? In backend development, the fewer technologies used, the better. Being a competent developer is more about using the tools available to the full extent, trying to avoid dependency on additional tools or frameworks as much as possible.

For instance, if you want to use the StringUtils class in your Java application, you don’t need to add a new framework to the stack; instead, you can use import org.apache.commons.lang3.StringUtils; to import the functionality.

There must be a clearly defined purpose and careful consideration of the impact adding a new framework or language will have on the software.

If you add dependencies in the tech stack without considering the impact, it can be miserable. Many library conflicts, incompatibilities, and security threats arise because of frameworks or transitive dependencies. It is why the lesser the dependencies, the fewer the bugs.

Automate system configuration and installation

How do you design the software to be deployed to new servers? Are they easy to install on a new server? If you are not automating the configuration files, the software will require manual installation. Over time, the software will evolve to new versions, but the manual installation instructions might become incompatible with these updates. Ultimately, you will spend much more time installing the application than you should.

It would help if you learned to use containerization to get applications up and running with minimal effort and zero configuration. Containerization is application-level virtualization. RedHat defines it as “the packaging of software code with all its necessary components like libraries, frameworks, and other dependencies so that they are isolated in their container.”

Backend developers must focus on creating self-contained systems. It lowers the risks of running into issues due to different versions or incompatibility between languages, frameworks, and operating systems.

Make it easier to replicate issues

Replicating the issue a customer faces is the hardest step of the debugging process. The problems that may take minutes to patch can often take hours to replicate. As a backend developer, you should design systems to make it easier to reproduce issues.

Developers working with the system you design should be able to replicate issues faced by customers quickly. It would help if you made it simpler to configure the application without breaking things to make it happen.

For instance, you should make tools available to allow other developers to quickly import from the production database. When a customer complains about an issue, a developer will need data to replicate the problem. It is infeasible to import the entire production database. Debugging gets easier when tools are available to pull a few required records from the production database in order to simulate the error.

Conclusion

Backend developers ensure ease of use, configuration simplicity, and easy debugging. We hope you will follow these recommendations to design systems that are easy to debug. Talent500 is a platform for talented backend developers to find jobs at Fortune 500 companies. Sign up today.

Top QA testing trends in 2022

Posted on April 29, 2022April 29, 2022 by supriya

QA engineers must stay ahead of crucial software testing trends to remain competitive and job-ready. According to the World Quality Report (WQR) 2021-22, companies are now emphasizing testing and QA objectives equally as they do on IT strategies such as enhancing customer experience, security, high quality of software, and responsiveness to business demands. QA role is no longer just about testing and bug fixing. In 2022, the QA function must contribute to improved outcomes for business growth.

The changed outlook has initiated some fast-paced technological developments in the software testing industry. Ability to scale automation, improved mobile testing, AI/ML-based testing, and blockchain testing are some of the trends you need to stay on top of to thrive as a QA engineer.

Let’s take a closer look at current QA trends.

1. Automation testing

Automated testing is perhaps the most important trend to keep up with. QA engineers can add value to the projects in terms of quality and cost with automation testing.

As a QA engineer, your role is to enable product development without compromising quality. You should anticipate bugs and errors early on. A key advantage of automation is running tests in batches without human intervention. With automated testing, you can run multiple scripts and regression tests at any hour. This approach makes it possible to test numerous system and configuration settings in parallel. The time saved can be invested in crucial in-depth manual testing.

The rising popularity of DevOps is enabling faster product development. It requires consistent testing to deliver results from every build. Automation testing can help keep up with speed. It is also essential to provide a quality product every time.

2. AI/ML-based testing

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are not new terms, but their application in software testing is a recent development. QA engineers must follow the trend. With the use of AI, you can generate several test cases faster. It can also help generate test case data for varying fields and validations.

Machine learning, the basis for AI, can help analyze any defaults or leaks in testing procedures, even before the test cases, to save time. Another impressive development AI is bringing to the software testing industry is the ability to write test cases in the English language that are automatically translated into programming language by tools. Testsigma is one such tool utilizing the power of AI and ML for software testing.

3. Mobile testing

Mobile devices now make up 55% of the devices used to connect to the internet, and mobile testing has become a standard for companies to deliver customer services at scale. There are three types in the current mobile app landscape: native, web, and hybrid. To cover an extensive array of platforms, most organizations choose hybrid apps.

QA engineers must be able to perform usability tests to ensure that the mobile apps are there as per users’ requirements. For guaranteeing a convincing mobile user experience, exploratory testing is also essential. While expert QA testers recommend using physical devices wherever feasible for mobile testing, familiarity with mobile testing tools such as Frank, Robotium, Appium, SeeTest, and Calabash is also a requirement for QA engineers. Mobile testing ensures that hybrid applications perform seamlessly both on small and large screen sizes.

4. API testing

API or Application Programming Interface testing is a software practice of testing APIs directly. It is part of integration testing that allows seamless integration with third-party API services. As the software systems grow complex, the APIs have to keep up to enable communication and data exchange.

API testing is another trend that will be on the rise in 2022. As thousands of applications use the same API, developers and testers need comprehensive test cases to test these APIs and ensure error-free application performance. Automating the API testing process can help QA teams quickly test APIs’ functionality, reliability, performance, and security.

5. Blockchain testing

Blockchain is a trending technology used by fintech applications to verify and trace multistep transactions. It is also used for verification and traceability by other applications. Ever since cryptocurrencies became popular, blockchain has been in great demand. Also, companies are increasingly leveraging blockchain to secure transactions.

Performing blockchain testing will be necessary for companies to establish a secure and functional infrastructure. As the technology is still evolving, the possibility of performance bottlenecks is higher. Testing can help anticipate such issues and eliminate any existing flaws. With blockchain testing, companies will be able to deliver high-quality services.

Bottomline

QA testing is essential for organizations as it can significantly reduce product delivery time and accelerate progress. QA engineers should keep a tab on testing trends such as automation testing and AI/ML to leverage these technologies for faster product delivery.

Large-scale enterprises and fast-growing start-ups trust Talent500 with their workforce requirements. We help candidates to upskill and keep in touch with recent industry developments for the best career opportunities. Join our pool of elite QA engineers to get hired at the best companies.