Table
of content
1.
Abstract……………………………………………………………. 1
2.
Introduction………………………………………………………… 2
3. Tools
Description………………………………………………….. 3
4. Feature
Description………………………………………………… 4
5. Comparison of
Tools………..……………………………………… 5
6. Conclusion………………………………………………………….
6
7. References
………………………………………………………….. 7
1. Abstract:
Software
testing is an essential phase of software development life cycle. Today many
software applications are written as web based application that runs in an
Internet Browser. The economic relevance of web based application increases the
importance of controlling and improving its quality. The quality assurance of a
system depends upon automation testing that decreases the test cost and
increases work efficiency. Here we have discussed various web automation
testing tools which will help us to understand the automation testing as well
as the tools available for automation testing. A variety of web based systems
and applications are tested by automation testing tools. The automation testing
script is used in test automation. To choose the best tool for a task, various
issues like ease of integration should be considered and weighed against the
cost and performance. Also the tool needs to be compatible with the design and
implementation of an application.
2. Introduction
Software testing is an essential
phase of software development life cycle. Today many software applications are
written as web based application that runs in an Internet Browser. The economic
relevance of web based application increases the importance of controlling and
improving its quality. The quality assurance of a system depends upon
automation testing that decreases the test cost and increases work efficiency.
In this paper we have discussed various web automation testing tools which will
help us to understand the automation testing as well as the tools available for
automation testing. A variety of web based systems and applications are tested
by automation testing tools. The automation testing script is used in test
automation. To choose the best tool for a task, various issues like ease of
integration should be considered and weighed against the cost and performance.
Also the tool needs to be compatible with the design and implementation of an
application.
Types
of testing
· Static and dynamic testing:
Static testing is done without executing the program
while the dynamic testing requires program execution.
· The box approach method:
In this method white-box and black-box testing is
involved.
· Manual and automation testing:
Manual testing is held without any tool while
automation testing is a process that involves automation of a manual process.
Web
automation testing and tools:
Web
testing:
It
is the name given to the software testing that focuses entirely on web
applications.
Web
automation testing:
It
is used to ensure the usual functionality works correctly, provides the ability
to reuse and extend the tests across multiple platforms and ensure that all the
users accessing the web application get results in an acceptable time.
Features:
·
Saves time and
money
·
Improves accuracy
·
Increases test
coverage
·
Does what manual
testing cannot
Tools
1)
Selenium
2)
HP-QTP
3)
Test-complete
4)
Watir
5)
WET
6)
Silk-test
7)
WinRunner
3.
Tools Description:
Ø
Selenium:
Selenium is
a portable software
testing framework for
web applications. Selenium
contributes a record-recap appliance for authoring tests
without learning a test scripting
language such as Selenium IDE. Selenium is a collection
of various software tools each with
a different approach to support test automation. Maximum
Selenium Quality Assurance
Engineers focus on the one or two tools that most meet
the needs of their task, but studying
all those tools will give you many different options for
approaching different test automation
issues. The complete testing suite of tools which is
available results in a rich set of testing
functions
specifically geared to the needs of testing of web applications. These
operations are
totally adaptable that gives many choices
for locating User Interface elements and comparing
expected test results against actual behavior of an application. One of
Selenium’s important
feature is the support for executing one’s tests on multiple browser
platforms 8. Selenium is
basically used for the functional testing of
web based applications. It can be used for
testing in the continuous integration
environment. It is also useful for agile testing. It is the
free software that works on all three
major platforms – Windows, Mac and Linux.
Ø
HP-QTP:
QTP stands for QuickTest
Professional, a product of Hewlett Packard (HP). This tool helps testers to perform an automated functional testing seamlessly without
monitoring once script development is complete HP QTP uses Visual Basic Scripting (VBScript) for automating the
applications. The Scripting Engine need not be installed exclusively as it is available part of the Windows OS. The
Current version of VBScript is 5.8 which is available as part of Win 7.
VBScript is NOT a object oriented language but a object based language.
HP Quick Test Professional
(QTP), an automated functional testing tool that helps testers to perform
automated regression testing in order to identify any
gaps, errors/defects in contrary to the actual/desired results of the
application under test. HP QTP uses Visual Basic Scripting (VBScript) for
automating the applications. The Scripting Engine need not be installed
exclusively as it is available part of the Windows OS.
Ø Test-complete:
Test-Complete is a graphical
interface record-playback automation tool. Test-Complete supports various
testing types and methodologies: unit testing, functional and GUI testing,
regression testing, distributed testing. Test Complete supports two types of
applications, web Applications and window applications. Testing is a process of
analyzing a software item to detect the differences between existing and
required conditions and to evaluate the features of the software. It is the important
phase of system development life cycle. Software companies follow the complete
software testing life cycle to test the application.
The selection of particular
automated testing tool is based on the type of application we are testing and
the cost associated with the tool Test Complete offers automated functional,
unit, regression, manual, data-driven, object-driven, and distributed, HTTP
load, stress and scalability testing in one easy-to-use it is a full-featured
environment for automated testing of Windows, .NET, Java and web applications.
It has been designed to free developers and QA departments from the massive
drain on time and energy required by manual testing.
Ø Watir:
Watir is built on the object-oriented
scripting language Ruby. Its developers have used it for large-scale system testing, functional testing, and for
automating user acceptance test. Watir uses a real programming language, is a free open source product, and
allows direct control over objects such as HTML and JavaScript in a Web page.
There are no layers between the HTML and test scripts—one can create its own if
required and no license fees.
Ø WET:
WET Web Tester is a web based testing tool
that drives an IE Browser directly and so the automated testing done is equivalent to how a user would drive the web pages. The
tool allows a user to perform all the operations required for testing web applications – like automatically clicking a
link, entering text in a text field, clicking a button etc. One may also
perform various checks as a part of the testing process by using Checkpoints.
The latest version of WET is 1.0. WET sits on
top of Watir, an automated test tool which uses Ruby scripting language. WET retains all the features that Watir has and
adds many usability related functionality 10.
WET started off as a small extension library for Watir – Watir
Extension Toolkit. It has come a long way and is
now bundled with many compelling features. As the WET code base has grown
multiple times, it now uses Watir just as the library to drive IE. WET
not only offers all that Watir offers but many more powerful features to make test automation effort a success. With the increased
features bundled into the code base, now WET no longer referred to be as Watir Extension Toolkit. It is simply called
as WET.
Ø SILK-TEST:
SilkTest® from Segue® is the
industry’s leading functional and regression testing product for enterprise
applications,whether they are deployed in Web, .NET, Java or traditional
client/server-based environments. SilkTest is an easy-to-use test automation environment
offering many features that enable users to be highly productive in their
software testing efforts. These features include workflow elements for test
creation and customization, direct database access and validation, the flexible
and robust 4Test® scripting language, a built-in recovery system for unattended testing and the
ability to test across multiple platforms, browsers and technologies with one
set of test scripts.
Ø Win-Runner:
Automated testing with WinRunner addresses these problems by dramatically
speeding up the testing process. You can create test scripts that check all
aspects of your application, and then run these tests on each new build. As
WinRunner runs tests, it simulates a human user by moving the mouse cursor over
the application, clicking Graphical User Interface (GUI) objects, and entering
keyboard input—but WinRunner does this faster than any human user.
4. Feature Description:
Selenium:
·
Easy to use and adopt
·
No need to learn test scripting language
·
Browser independent
·
Free software
·
Runs on major platforms i.e Windows, Mac, and
Linux
HP-QTP:
·
No skilled coder is required
·
Object Oriented programming language
·
Easy to use and navigate
·
Enables easy scheduling and monitoring
·
Used for Mobile Application Testing
Test-Complete:
·
Fully automated test recording from interactive
usage of the application
·
Uses key-word driven testing
·
Test visualization
·
Data-driven test using test, Excel and Database
data sources
·
Multi-browser support and cross-browser testing
WATIR:
·
It supports cross-platforms
·
Requires skilled coder
·
String and dynamic typing disciple
·
Written in Ruby (Programing language)
·
Does not run multiple scripts
WET:
Automation – Record and playback feature
·
Object parameterization
·
Ability to run multiple scripts
·
Script Re-usability
·
Integrated Data Driven support
·
Ease of creation of scripts
SILK-TEST:
·
Recovery System for 24x7x365 unattended testing
·
Basic Work flow for instant productivity
·
Data Driven Work flow for testing business logic
functionality using externally stored data
·
Auto-Complete for rapid test customization and
automation infrastructure development
·
Project Workspaces for organizing and sharing
test information
·
GUI abstraction layer for more reusable, easier
to maintain tests and scripts
·
Extensible, highly portable and easy-to-maintain
scripting language
·
Distributed testing for efficient usage of
hardware resources and increased productivity
Silk-Test Runtime for test execution and reporting
Win-Runner:
·
Functional
Regression Testing Tool
·
Windows Platform
Dependent
·
Only for
Graphical User Interface (GUI) based Application
·
Based on Object
Oriented Technology (OOT) concept
·
Only for Static
content
·
Record/Playback
Tool
5. Comparison of Tools
S.no
Name of tool
Language use
OS
Type
Release/
Development year
Licence
Devel-opment status
Develo-per
Language supported
Brows-er support
1
Selenium
Java
Cross-plat-form
Software testing framework for
web application
May 22, 2013,(2004)
Apache
2.0
Activre
Jason huggins
Domain specific language
All major developer
2
HP-QTP
VB script
MS-wind-ows
Test automation
2006
proprietary
Active
Mercury Interactive
VB script
Firefox 3.0 and later Google
chrome
3
Test-Complete
Java
MS-windows
Test automation
Sept.3 2013/ 1999
proprietary
Active
SmartBear software Inc.
VB script,
Jscript,C++,C#script,
DelphiScript
IE,
Firefox, Google Chrome
4
Watir
Ruby
Cross-plat-form
Software testing framework for
web application
Sept.30, 2012
BSD
Active
Bret Pettichard and Paul Roger
Java, .Net, c#
IE, later multiple
browsers
5
WET
Ruby
MS-Windows
Web-Based Testing Tool
2012
MIT
Active
Gov. of Canada
Ruby
IE
6
Silk-test
4Test Scripting language
MS-windows
Test automation
Oct.10, 2012
proprietary
Active
Segue
software
Java, 4Test, VB,C#,
VB.net
IE and Firefox
7
Win-Runner
C language
MS-windows, Linux
Load Testing Tool
2006
proprietary
Active
HP software division
Test Scripting language
IE, Netscape
Selenium:
It uses Java language and also supports
cross-platform. It has Apache 2.0 and it runs on all web browsers. It has
language support for domain specific languages.
HP-QTP:
It uses and supports VB Script and
operates on MS-Windows. It has proprietary license. It runs on IE, Firefox and
Google Chrome.
Test-Complete:
It uses Java language and has
MS-Windows support. It has proprietary license. It runs on IE, Firefox and
Google Chrome Browsers. It supports VB Script, JavaScript, C++,C#Script and
Delphi Script.
Watir:
It uses Ruby language and supports
cross platforms. It has BSD license. It
initially had only IE support but later it received multi-browser support. It
supports java, .Net, and C#.
WET:
It uses and supports Ruby language and
has MS-Windows support. It has MIT license. It has IE (browser) support.
Silk-Test:
It uses 4Test scripting language and
has MS-Windows support. It has proprietary license. It runs on Internet
Explorer and Firefox. It supports Java,
4Test, VB, C#, and VB.Net.
Win-runner:
It uses C language, and has MS-Windows
and Linux support. It has proprietary license. It runs on IE and Netscape. It
supports test Scripting language.
6. Conclusion
We have analyzed different
automated tools for web testing. Web based automation testing is concerned with
testing web based applications in an automated way. A variety of automation
tools are feasible for testing web applications. To decide which tool is best,
one has to tally the requirements with the tool’s features. For instance if an
organizations is looking for rapid results he will go for speed and if an organization
struggles with their budget, it is likely to search for a cost effective tool.
The requirements can be categorized according to the feasible tools.
If an organization
requires speed in testing then the possible testing tool is Test-Complete,
but the tools comes with a cost. The Test-Complete has to be licensed and it’s
license is quite costly. So if the organization prefers speed over cost then it
will be the right call to use Test-Case. However it the organization can’t
handle the cost then they will have to manage the trade-off.
On the other hand if
an organization wants a tool that is cost effective, they may have to
settle for a tool that has a very slow testing speed. Or if the material to be
tested is on large scale the tool should be chosen according to this specific
need. For example for large-scale testing Watir is most suitable
choice. So it is clear that a tool is best for a job only if it is chosen
according to the need.
An organization that
wants a balanced tool may consider Selenium. It is both cost
effective and flexible but again it is not best known for its speed. So in
general if is a good tool but specifically- well it depends on the
specifications.
Finally, all testing
tools have their strengths and weaknesses or limitations. It is important to
know the requirements to choose the best tool for a test case to perform most
effectively. All cases are to be judged by their suitability instead of their
shear performance or cost.
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