Running repetitive test cases, regular regression tests, massive performance tests simulating an excessive system load, and assessing critical functionality are rather challenging tasks for manual testers. Test automation can bring you great relief. However, to make a successful transition, it is essential to choose the right automation tool.
Understand Your Business Needs and Tool Market
Companies that already have a team of testers might find open-source automation tools like Selenium lucrative. Indeed, they are free and provide experienced technicians with flexibility in adjusting the tests to non-conventional scenarios. While such solutions can enhance your testing routine, they require extensive human supervision and engagement in the preparation and maintenance of a testing environment, which causes downtime and generates high costs.
Another option is a commercial automation tool. Usually, such a solution is already tailored to certain testing tasks or particular software. If the application you would like to test has a dedicated tool, it can be a sensible choice for you, even though you will have to pay a subscription fee. Providing you choose the option with sufficient functionality, you will be able to get a much higher ROI than with an open-source tool.
Check the offer of commercial solutions for your software and consider the following criteria for the best choice.
Desired Test Coverage
First of all, make sure the tool you would like to get has sufficient test coverage. For example, both Executive Automats and RSAT, one of the Microsoft Automation Testing Tools, are dedicated to testing Microsoft Dynamics 365.
RSAT is a free tool provided by Microsoft itself, however, it is designed exclusively for functional testing of its financial module. Executive Automats offered by a Microsoft Gold Partner, XPLUS, supports testing of other ERP modules and automates performance testing.
Furthermore, there are other commercial tools with performance testing functionality. Still, they require an extra payment for each added user simulator, while Executive Automats does not limit the simulation capacity required for performance testing.
Fast and Simple Implementation and Test Preparation
Secondly, it is recommended to choose a tool that can be easily deployed and used for building your test cases. This will allow you to benefit from test automation as soon as possible.
As mentioned above, open-source solutions are not accessible straight away. Professional developers and testers are needed to create a testing environment. No-code tools like Executive Automats can be a wise choice if you want to avoid the expenses related to the environment setup and test preparation. Such software can be used right after installation and creating a test case with a user-friendly interface can take just a couple of minutes.
Powerful Automation
Last but not least, automation means autonomous task execution. Thus, the best automation tool will require minimum human involvement.
The functionality that improves automation includes codeless test creation described before, flexible test scheduling with the possibility of conducting tests without human supervision, and planning numerous concurrent testing processes. Additionally, automation is improved even further with reusable test cases and automated report generation.
Altogether, these features considerably reduce assistance from testing experts and allow people without a technical background to plan and execute tests.
