Test Automation Cannot Be an Afterthought
If you’re writing an article at a major online publication, you’re going to have an editor who checks your work. And while you’ll likely put plenty of time, effort, and thought into the piece, just knowing you have someone waiting behind another screen at the end to clean up any mistakes can make you work a bit differently.
In the world of software testing, automation can be viewed as an editor, of sorts. Previously, manual testers had to be extremely thorough to guarantee quality, since they were the final check before products got into the hands of users. Now, testers can lean on automation tools to catch any bugs that might have been missed.
But just because test automation can be looked at as a safety net doesn’t mean you can treat it lightly. In order to properly test your applications, you need to align your automation with the rest of your testing—as well as your agile or DevOps architecture—in order to reap the greatest rewards.
Speaking in an interview with AgileConnection, Michael Nauman, a testing lead for AutoCAD Web, went into detail about how to keep your testing in sync and why that’s critical.
“Test automation, as well as infrastructure automation, should never be an afterthought. No code should be submitted without unit and/or integration tests,” Nauman explained. “Test automation is your safety net and you don’t want bugs slipping through it. Once a CI (continuous integration) system is up and running it tends to stabilize, at least it should. Test automation, on the other hand, should constantly be updated as functionality is modified or added to your application.”
You need to have a broad understanding of how your test automation works, what it’s checking, what it can’t check, and why it’s critical to your application’s success. If you just look at automation as an editor you can just throw your work to and know it’s going to come back spotless, you’re going to release incomplete or broken products.
“Test automation is the critical component of your CI system and it must be trustworthy. Knowing what your test automation covers is just as important as knowing what it doesn’t cover,” he continued. “Missing tests or unreliable tests should be considered debt and therefore tracked, prioritized, and implemented along with feature work.”
Test automation is integral to the success of your software team, but make sure it’s a priority and not an afterthought.
