Why Integration Testing Is Crucial for Mobile Apps
Mobile technology is everywhere. It is no longer a luxury to have a mobile application for your users; it has become more of a necessity. When customers use a mobile app you built, they expect seamless integration.
They want to be able to start an action on the desktop browser version of the product and to complete the action on the mobile application. For instance, if the user is searching for a flight, he or she will expect to start the process on the desktop and save the searches there, then use the mobile application to open the saved searches and complete a flight booking.
Users also want to see the same data across multiple devices, such as their desktops and mobile devices. For example, in a banking application, users should be able to log into their bank accounts on their computers, tablets, and smartphones and see the same data consistently across these devices.
Finally, customers should be able to use Internet of Things devices effectively. If the user has a wearable device, such as a Fitbit, he or she should have the ability to trigger any action from a desktop, tablet, phone, or the device and see the necessary results as needed.
It’s easy to see from these examples that performing integration testing for mobile applications is essential, due to the need to sync these apps with all the other devices and interfaces.
In these instances, it’s also important to consider information security. Multiple devices are trying to access the user information, which is stored in physical databases or in the cloud. With this being the case, it’s necessary to restrict unauthorized access to user data. So, while doing integration testing, it is also worthwhile to consider different vulnerabilities in security.
The Open Web Application Security Project, or OWASP, aims to set some standards to better understand the security issues associated with mobile applications and the IoT. It is a good idea to go through the guides OWASP provides and test for security issues while doing integration testing.
One thing that has helped me while doing integration testing is creating mind maps of different testing strategies I would like to exercise on the mobile application. The testing strategies may vary based on the type of mobile application being tested.
With the onset of different products being designed to work in the mobile and IoT ecosystems, it is all the more important for testers to tune their thinking to how the end-user will be using the applications in these ecosystems, and try to come up with different scenarios accordingly.
Raj Subramanian is presenting the session Vulnerabilities and Bugs in Mobile Apps with Quick Tours at the Mobile Dev + Test 2017 conference, April 24–28 in San Diego, California.
