Testing Tools
In the software development life cycle (SDLC), testing is the phase where developers check whether the software satisfies the specific requirements, needs, and expectations of the customer by testing for bugs, defects, and errors. Testing tools help testers to find issues in their products before the users do, ultimately resulting in better quality software.
Testing typically involves manual testers, automation engineers, and developers. There are many types of testing, some of which include: unit testing, integration testing, functional testing, performance testing, regression testing, acceptance testing, and usability testing. Some tools focus on just one category, while others provide comprehensive coverage. Testing can also be divided into two categories based on transparency:
White Box Testing:
This is a software testing method that involves testing the internal structure, design, and coding of a piece of software. Specifically, it tests for things like internal security holes, broken paths in the coding process, the flow of specific inputs through the code, expected output, and functionality of conditional loops. Code is visible to the tester, which is where the “white box” or “see-through box” concept comes from. White box testing is also known by a variety of other names, such as Clear Box Testing, Open Box Testing, Transparent Box Testing, Code-Based Testing, and Glass Box Testing.
Black Box Testing
Black box testing also involves testing the internal structure, design, and coding of software. It is distinguished from white box testing in that the internal design of the software is not known to the tester, and is therefore a “black box”. Its goals are to find incorrect or missing functions, interface errors, errors in data structures or external database access, behavior or performance errors, and initialization and termination errors. It is usually categorized as functional testing and can also be called Behavioral Testing.
Within the modern testing sphere, shift-left and automation are two concepts that are becoming increasingly important.
Shift-Left
Shift-left is the practice of testing earlier in the software delivery process. Rather than deferring thorny issues to an unknown later date, testers can improve quality by catching errors before they snowball or become critical. Shift-left focuses mainly on integration testing and identifying integration issues as soon as possible.
Test Automation
Test automation is done through a special software tool separate from the software being tested. It allows testers to reuse tests in a repeatable process, thereby eliminating time-consuming and repetitive tasks. These tests can also be run overnight, which saves time for all involved. Generally, test automation is considered to be critical for agile development, CI/CD, and DevOps. Despite that, it is not always appropriate to automate all testing in an organization, and many organizations perform both automated and manual testing.
Looking ahead to the future, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) may play a key role by allowing organizations to automate even further.
What are Testing Tools?
Testing tools support test activities such as requirements, planning, test execution and automation, and defect logging.
When selecting the appropriate testing tool for your organization, there is no one tool that does it all. It is important to compare features and evaluate requirements, such as:
1. Which platforms are covered?
2. Which scripting languages are covered?
3. Are programming skills required, or can a layperson operate the tool?
4. Ease of installation and setup
5. User interface
6. Object storage and maintenance
7. What integrations are available?
8. Product support and documentation
9. Licensing and cost
In regards to automated testing, it is particularly useful for static and repetitive tests that don’t change from one test cycle to the next. Regression testing, smoke testing, data-driven testing, and performance testing can all benefit from automation.
Benefits of Testing Tools
Testing tools ensure that businesses are shipping the best possible product to the end user. Automated testing confers certain benefits, such as: time saved, improved quality, early bug detection, 24/7 testing, reusability, distributed test execution, robust reporting, improved test coverage, better employee utilization, less room for human error, increased collaboration, and improved ROI.
In certain industries, such as medical devices, test details must be documented in a regimented process. Test management tools can automatically keep a log of those details for compliance purposes. For companies that release multiple times a day, such as Amazon and Netflix, automated testing is an absolute necessity.
Testing Tools
Apache JMeter desktop application is open-source software designed to load test functional behavior and measure performance. It is generally used for load and stress testing to measure the performance of services such as web applications, but can also be used for functional testing and database serving testing.
BlazeMeter is a commercial, self-service load testing platform as a service (PaaS) tool. It is compatible with Apache JMeter and Selenium, and integrates with CI, CD, and APM tools.
Browsersync is a free and open source tool that helps you test faster by synchronizing file changes and interactions in real-time across multiple devices. It also automates tasks, such as the compilation of SASS files, image compression, and form replication.
Checkmarx CxSAST is an enterprise application security testing and static code analysis solution that scans source code, identifies security vulnerabilities within it, and provides remediation with sample code. Features include static application security testing, dependency scanning, interactive application security testing, and runtime application security testing. It is flexible, integrates with other popular CI/CD tools, supports a wide range of programming languages, and is a solid option for organizations looking to implement DevSecOps.
Cucumber is an open source collaborative tool for executable specifications. It runs automated acceptance tests in a behavior-driven development (BDD) style. With Cucumber, the requirements specifications, tests and documentation are all the same documents, providing a single source of truth for the whole team.
FitNesse is a web server, a wiki and an automated testing tool for software. It enables customers, testers, and programmers to collaborate to create and edit test cases on a wiki. Those wiki pages can then be run as tests. FitNesse is commonly used with JUnit or NUnit, which help to test-drive and refactor your code.
Galen Framework is an open source layout and functional testing framework for websites. It supports both JavaScript and Java tests, works with Selenium Grid, and can generate detailed HTML reports.
Gatling is an open-source load and performance testing tool based on Scala, Akka, and Netty. Its features include: a standalone HTTP proxy recorder, Scala-based scripting, an expressive self-explanatory DSL for test development, an asynchronous non-blocking engine for maximum performance, and excellent support of HTTP(S) protocols.
Gauntlt is a ruggedization framework that enables security testing that is usable by devs, ops and security. It provides attack adapters for curl, nmap, sslyze, and garmr, and also features a generic command line adapter to run any command line tool.
Jasmine is a behavior-driven development framework for testing JavaScript code. It has easy-to-read syntax and does not rely on browsers, DOM, or any JavaScript framework. Thus it's suited for websites, Node.js projects, or anywhere that JavaScript can run.
Apache JMeter is an open source Java application from the Apache Software Foundation. It is designed to load test functional behavior and measure performance on a variety of services, with a focus on web applications.
JUnit is a unit testing framework for Java. Developers use it to write and run repeatable tests.
Karma is an open source JavaScript test runner that runs on Node.js. Karma is highly configurable, integrates with popular continuous integration packages (Jenkins, Travis, and Semaphore) and has excellent plugin support.
Katalon Studio is a free automation testing tool that is powered by Selenium. It is designed to create and reuse automated test scripts for UI without coding, and allows for the testing of UI elements like pop-ups, iFrames, and wait time. Compared to Selenium, Katalon is easier to deploy, offers more integrations, and has features for analytics and reporting. It is extremely easy to set up and works immediately out of the box. However, it is not open source and its community is small, so support may be limited. It is best characterized as an emerging solution that works for small and medium size businesses.
Load Impact is a cloud-based load testing system that tests applications for scale and performance across regions. It calculates the response rate of every transferred resource, and also measures CPU usage, memory usage, disk I/O and network I/O.
Mocha is a popular Node.js testing framework that is commonly used for integration and unit testing. It supports asynchronous testing, is compatible with the major web browsers, provides a variety of reporters, and works in both test driven development (TDD) and behavior driven development (BDD) environments.
NUnit is a unit testing framework for all .Net languages. It is similar to JUnit for Java, and is part of a family of related testing frameworks known as xUnit. With NUnit, tests can be run continuously and concurrently, and results are provided immediately.
OWASP Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP) is one of the world's most popular web application security testing tools. It automatically finds security vulnerabilities in your web applications while you are developing and testing your applications. It can be used as a man-in-the-middle between browser and app server, as a standalone application, or as a daemon process without UI.
Pa11y is a free and open source automated accessibility testing tool that runs HTML CodeSniffer from the command line for programmatic accessibility reporting.
Pytest is an easy-to-use Python testing tool that doesn't require boilerplate code or an API. Its features include: detailed info on failing assert statements, auto-discovery of test modules and functions, modular fixtures for managing small or parametrized long-lived test resources, and rich plugin architecture.
QUnit is an easy-to-use JavaScript unit testing framework. It's used by the jQuery, jQuery UI and jQuery Mobile projects and is capable of testing any generic JavaScript code.
Ranorex Studio is a commercial Windows GUI test automation framework used to test desktop, web-based, and mobile applications. It is built on Microsoft’s .NET platform and supports C# and VB.NET. Its key features include easy installation for non-programmers, image recognition, recording and replay, data-driven and keyword-driven tests, cross-platform and device testing, and reports and logs.
Ranorex Studio is a premium, powerful testing tool that is more comprehensive and also more expensive than many other tools in its category. It is a good solution for implementing automated testing in continuous delivery and DevOps environments.
Created in 2005, Rspec is a testing framework for behavior-driven development (BDD) for Ruby. It allows you to conduct Unit, Functional, and Feature tests. RSpec is composed of multiple libraries, which are designed to work together, or can be used independently with other testing tools like Cucumber or Minitest. It is one of the most frequently used testing libraries for Ruby in production applications.
Rspec features a simple syntax that reads more like English than your typical code. Like all Ruby related tools, it is available in the form of the RSpec Ruby gem, which makes it easy to install.
Sauce Labs provides a variety of browsers, OSes, emulators, and simulators that can be used to test applications thoroughly. Sauce Labs also integrates with the continuous delivery system allowing you to work with the automation frameworks of your choice to help you test faster, with better automation and collaboration.
Selenium is an open source tool that is used for automating the tests carried out on web browsers. The Selenium IDE provides a playback tool for authoring tests without the need to learn a test scripting language. It also provides a test domain-specific language (Selenese) to write tests in a number of popular programming languages, including C#, Groovy, Java, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Scala. Selenium deploys on Windows, Linux, and macOS.
Serverspec is an infrastructure testing tool for Ruby that allows you to write RSpec tests to check that your server is configured correctly. Tests can also be driven by many of the popular configuration management tools, such as Puppet, Ansible, CFEngine and Itamae.
SoapUI is a free and open-source test automation framework for APIs like SOAP and REST. Its functionality includes web service inspection, invoking, development, simulation and mocking, functional testing, load and compliance testing. It is also offered as a paid pro version, which has advanced features like test history, SQL query builder, and enhanced support.
SoapUI's strengths are its easy setup, well-designed user interface, and breadth of integrations. It is simple to learn and operate even for non-technical users. However, it can be slow and the free version lacks important features like version control.
SpecFlow is an open source testing framework that supports Behaviour Driven Development (BDD). As part of the Cucumber family, SpecFlow uses the official Gherkin parser and supports the .NET framework, Xamarin and Mono.
Test Studio is ideal for a no-code or low-code approach to QA test automation, application monitoring, performance, and load testing, web/marketing process automation, and mobile app automation. Get automation for WPF, Silverlight, Web, HTML, Angular, React, KUIB, iOS, Android, Mobile Web, and APIs.
TestComplete is an automated GUI testing tool for mobile, web, and desktop applications. It creates automated tests across multiple devices, platforms, and environments, and is suitable for beginners or experienced automation engineers. TestComplete enables teams to script in multiple languages including JavaScript, VBScript, and Python, or to build complex tests via record and replay.
TestNG is an open source automated testing framework for Java. It is inspired by JUnit and NUnit, but with unique additional features like annotations, flexible code configurations, and support for parameters. It is designed to be more powerful and easy-to-use, while covering a wider range of test categories.
ThreatModeler is an enterprise-level automated threat modeling platform that utilizes VAST (Visual, Agile and Simple Threat Modeling) methodology, is PFD-based, and identifies threats based on a customizable comprehensive threat library. It takes a proactive approach to identifying entry points to prevent security breaches in applications and computer systems. Distinguishing features include process flow architecture diagrams, a centralized and customizable threat library, and an intelligent threat engine. Unlike most other threat modeling tools, ThreatModeler has a plethora of cloud-friendly features.
The Tricentis Tosca application provides an easy-to-use interface for writing automation test cases without scripting, allowing teams to collaborate with members who have no programming skills. Tosca provides seamless traceability of requirements with weighted tests, allowing test administrators to get an overview of progress and perform the correct number of tests.
