A study conducted by Wipro Limited, a consulting and business process services company, has found an 85% jump in Test Automation across industries to keep pace with the evolving technology landscape. The study, titled ‘State of Quality 2016’ was conducted over a period of nine months by Wipro’s Testing Services practice using analytical tools, with the objective of identifying distinct patterns and key trends in software testing. The study also found that nearly 73% of all performance testing comprises of the testing of web applications.
The study is based on insights from Wipro’s Testing and Quality Assurance (QA) engagements, advisory and consulting engagements, and social media feedback. It incorporates insights based on data collected from the Banking, Financial Services and Insurance (BFSI), Retail & Consumer Goods, Healthcare & Life Sciences, Hi-tech & Manufacturing, Media & Telecom and Utilities industries in USA, Canada, Europe and Asia.
The study focuses on the five cornerstones of testing and Quality Assurance (QA) engagements:
- Automation
- Performance Engineering
- Test Environment and Data Management
- End Customer Experience (Mobile Applications)
- Quality Engineering
Key findings from the study:
Automation leads the way: The study found an 85% increase in Test Automation over a two-year period across all industry domains. This growth is fueled by easily accessible Open Source tools in the market today
Web applications dominate performance testing: With increasing digitization of businesses, Web Applications dominate among the platforms that require performance testing - nearly 73% of all performance testing comprises of the testing of web applications
Waning interest in performance engineering: Performance engineering (PE) ensures performance-driven development throughout the Software development life-cycle and not just during the Testing phase (Performance Testing). A significant observation in this sphere is that only 30% of client organizations demonstrate a keen interest in Performance Engineering and have the talent to realize the benefits of Automation Process Management tools. This low absorption is due to expensive set of tools, lack of skilled talent, and late introduction of Performance Testing in the systems development life cycle
No real life hacks for Test Environment and Test Data Management: Virtualization, mobile and cloud have impacted Test Environment Management (TEM) and Test Data Management (TDM) in a major way in the last decade. Most organizations find it challenging to adapt to these in addition to constantly evolving business requirements. As a result, the number of defects in testing engagements have gone up to nearly 13% due to software test environment issues; fixing these takes up 28% of the testing team’s effort.
Interestingly, 90% of organizations have concerns regarding generating test data, an essential element for successful execution of revised or new applications. Also, 25 to 30% of test scenarios remain untested in the absence of a comprehensive data masking solution
End Customer Experience indicates the need for increased investments in quality engineering and testing: An analysis of
Social Media feedback on 30 mobile applications across North America and Europe, from the retail and banking domains, highlighted that 59% end users are dissatisfied with their applications for reasons of stability, interoperability, and usability. Banking app users in Europe had concerns regarding the security of the application. These indicate the increasing need for quality engineering and testing
Increasing focus on Quality Engineering: Software testing is increasingly moving from defect detection to defect prevention. Consequently, 66% of organizations currently use Software Developers in Test (SDET) in conjunction with traditional testers on all projects, ensuring quality development and prevent defects right from inception. This signifies a shift towards quality engineering - the management, development, operation and maintenance of IT systems and enterprise architectures with high quality standards