The Stellar Role Of Quality Assurance and Software Testing

Quality assurance testing plays a significant role by providing the quality assurance of a custom-built software package to confirm that it functions completely as crystallized in the agreement between the software developer and the customer. Software testing is defined as ‘the process of validation and verification that the custom-built computer software package satisfies the stakeholder by - meeting the requirement as crystallized in the design & development, all features functioning as expected, being worthy of implementation with all the features, and satisfying the needs of the stakeholders

Thus, software testing services and the quality assurance pave the penultimate stage in the organization‘s automation efforts.

Internal or external QA software testing

Scope & purpose Many organizations have a team of experts in the field of quality assurance & testing in this field. An equal number of companies resort to utilize the services of software testing services provided by external agencies. The basic purpose is to bring out the defects, if any, in the developed software and ensure that it fulfills 100& expectations. The scope of software testing covers the thorough examination and execution of the code in a variety of environments and conditions.

Testing Methods
The various testing methods include - Static testing (for reviews, walkthroughs, and inspection - verification), Dynamic testing (for checking discrete functions or models - validation), White-box testing (for internal structures & working of the program – API testing, code coverage, fault injection, mutation testing, function coverage, and statement coverage), Black-box testing (for testing the functionality without being aware about internal implementation), Visual testing (for noting the happenings at points of failure as serves  for problem analysis), Ad hoc or exploratory testing (for  random checks), and Grey Box testing (for testing the functionality being aware about internal implementation).

Testing Levels

• Unit testing - checking a particular section or component of the code for functionality
• Integral testing - Verifying the functionality of all interfaces
• System testing - verifying the functionality of the complete system
• Acceptance testing - the final stage before release for implementation of the tested software
• Installation testing - Checking the correctness of installation
• Compatibility testing - Verifying that there are no unintended consequences
• Smoke & sanity testing - clearing for further process of testing
• Regression testing - finding defects after a code change
• Alpha testing - simulated/operational testing of the software package
• Beta-testing - After alpha - external user acceptance
• Functional testing - verifying a specific function
• Non-functional testing - verifying the scalability to check for any unstable conditions
• Destructive testing - Causing the software to fail & verifying the function even when given wrong inputs
• Software performance testing or load testing - check system function at a workload
• Usability testing - Checking the ease of use
• Accessibility testing - compliance with standards
• Security testing - Prevent system intrusion
• Development testing - synchronized application of defect detention & prevention
• Top-down & Bottom-up testing - testing the top components first or lowest level component first

In most of the advanced testing procedure, the testing is entirely automated.

Testing Stages
The various stages in software quality assurance testing process are test plan, creating a testability matrix & following it, test case, test script, test suite, test fixture, test harness, and then the final certification.