Test automation has played a huge role in fascinating the software testing community. The software testers consider it like a magical spell that can resolve all of their technology-related issues and create customer delight. However, in reality, this situation is a little different. It is not as easy as it seems to be. There is another side of the coin which is called manual testing. The testing squad should toss the coin to balance which is considered a final victory.
Sometimes organizations usually divide their QA resources into teams. One team is supposed to execute manual testing and the other one is supposed to do test automation. In other situations, one tester has to perform both methods. The difference between a testing methodology that provides the team value and benefit would be to strike the right balance.
Keeping the scenario in mind, we are presenting to you some ways to align your automation testing with a manual testing strategy.
Know Your Regression Suite
According to the top automation testing companies, the main objective of automation testing is to save time and enhance efficiency. Therefore, you should determine the tests you regularly see yourself running all the time. After any update to code or integration, strengthening the regression suite will provide you with an enhanced vision of the test you want to handle.
One thing that you must keep in mind is that when an app changes, the evolution takes its time. Therefore, it is advantageous to offer a suite that ensures simple reliability.
The technique to know which operating systems, computers, and devices can be utilized in the regression suite is to see the conditions that you would want to test on.
Communication with The Developers
Developers cannot advise you regarding the things that you should automate. However, they can offer you useful inputs regarding the app’s condition.
Therefore, it is very important to have regular communication with the developers when you are glancing at the structure. This will provide you with a comprehensive overview of the things that have been evolved and the features and places that are required to be assessed to attain extra input.
Don’t sweat the little things
Smaller test cases are usually better and provide you with samples that are sustainable and reusable for automation. The impact of automation depends upon the app’s condition. This shows that the smaller tests are immune to enhancements in the user interface. For this reason, tests for integration and units are perfectly suitable for automation.
On the contrary, difficult and longer test cases are suitable for manual review. This provides more space for the developer to develop the app that takes minimum scripting time. It guarantees that you will not have to refer back to the script to find out that it requires to be modified if the app’s user interface gets customized.
Risk Analysis
Risk is considered as the main sign while deciding to execute automation or not. There are numerous ways to see which tests are more prone to risks, understanding these does not infer that you want to completely rule out other test cases that aren’t high-risk. Such test cases are perfect for manual testing.
You divide test cases into three categories while evaluating risks: high, medium, and low. The test cases that are at high risk must be put on the list of automation suites. However, if you see medium to low-risk cases that you see as useful to evaluate to attain input, then this is something you should do manually.
Know-how of Inadequacies of Automation Testing Process
Even the top automation testing companies do not automate everything. It doesn’t matter what testing systems you have, how many Selenium commands you know, and how talented you are in automation testing, sometimes you have to amalgamate these both testing strategies.
CAPTCHAs are extremely common on e-commerce pages and they are very difficult to automate. This demonstrates that everything cannot be automated; sometimes we have to incorporate manual testing.
Hence, this is not the only situation where only automation testing isn’t a good idea. There are dozens of scenarios that should be automated but scripting is a complex process that should be done manually.
Conclusion
After viewing the discussion above, it can be concluded that while selecting between automation and manual testing, you are advised to calculate the Return on Investment (ROI). Automation takes a lot of time when it comes to managing, coding, and evaluating. If the outcomes you attain via tests are not worth taking the time to automate, perhaps you should do it manually and look for unique methods to save resources, money, and time.
