Why software testing is increasingly being outsourced and what should businesses consider

Among other business activities, software testing (ST) is being increasingly outsourced nowadays to reduce the exorbitant expenses that are associated with it as well as to make sure that the evaluation is conducted by the best in the business.

Let us get into further details. Various critical business applications are being evaluated by third party vendors these days, as each and every business is striving to cut costs. Software development and testing are highly expensive processes and involve a number of critical parameters to be attained. Testing is often plagued by software failures and other uncalled for incidents that compel huge investments to go haywire. That is the reason, ST often demands huge investments to make sure that there is enough fund for rigorous in-house evaluation of the software by the most experienced as well as trained software professionals along with an able backup process to compensate any kind of failure whatsoever.

The digitisation of modern businesses has led to increased reliance or dependency on software systems for internal as well as external business activities. This has in turn led to increased emphasis by the business houses on evaluation or testing of these software systems within the process of development. All these have collectively resulted in the increase of software testing outsourcing.

A large chunk of ST centres where the projects are outsourced are located offshore – in countries like India, China or other countries in Asia. This is done after a lot of impeccable planning, taking into account the location of these countries as well as the difference in time zones wherein these countries are located. In case a company can obtain the results of evaluation over night, it effectively helps them to streamline the process of development they follow.

Now let us discuss the factors that the businesses need to consider while outsourcing software testing services.

Selection of Engagement Models

The first factor that needs to be considered is the engagement model that a business should rely on. This is ostensibly the most crucial aspect as the entire outsourcing plan will depend upon a correct decision. The process includes a number of factors – evaluating strategies of international business, selection of a geographical location, a thorough understanding of the landscape along with deciding on the particular strategy, etc. Some of the engagement models are:

Incremental Outsourcing

Businesses can opt for mitigating the risks associated with outsourcing by breaking the entire project into smaller projects that are more manageable or can be outsourced to the service providers in stages.

Holistic or total outsourcing

In this particular model, multiple projects or programs are outsourced to a service provider who takes up the responsibility of program management as well as the delivery on the client's behalf.

Mobilization

The agreement includes a mobilization period for both the parties. This particular phase includes setting up of an effective communication protocol between the client and the vendor that defines breakdown structure of work, standard template sharing, setting up of test strategy, etc. This generally includes testing engineers and leads, project managers along with technical specialists. Knowledge acquisition, evaluation of infrastructure, integration with the different third party service providers are other aspects of mobilization.

Whatever processes or steps are followed, every single company needs to do a lot of homework in a thorough as well as impeccable way before they opt for ST outsourcing. An able service provider will be able to effectively single out the pitfalls at the very outset. This ensures that uncalled for situations can be avoided later on while testing the software and delivering the project well within the deadline. Besides, it will also help in reducing the costs and help the companies to stick to the budget that they have initially fixed for the completion of the project in question.

You can hire testers from top software testing companies in India who can help you accomplish testing within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide software testing services. If you would like to hire certified software testers from us, we would be glad to assist you at Mindfire Solutions.

Avoid QA Challenges with a Unified Test Management System

Enterprises often explore innovative ways to optimize the performance of their software applications. Some organizations automate the testing efforts, whereas others opt for test management systems. But a number of recent reports have highlighted how an organization can optimize quality assurance (QA) efficiency through a single or unified test management system. Agile project management approach requires organizations to build a cohesive unit by eliminating the barriers between the team of software developers and testers. As the efficiency of the QA process is affected due to diverse and incompatible systems, it becomes essential for each organization to avoid QA challenges with a single test management system.

QA Challenges that can be Addressed with a Unified Test Management System

Integration of Onsite and Offshore Business Units

A constant increase is noted in the organizations outsourcing their software testing projects to reduce operational costs and shorten release cycles. Many enterprises even develop and test software applications in a distributed environment. So the test managers find it a daunting challenge to integrate the onsite and offshore business units. A unified test management system will enable them to facilitate smooth and uninterrupted communication between in-house and remote teams regardless of their location.

Smooth and Uninterrupted Communication

An organization must implement an efficient communication system to identify and fix the bugs, errors or flaws in a software application immediately. The organizations that hire skilled remote QA engineers to curtail project cost must facilitate clear communication between the developers and testers. Often the absence of real-time updates affects the project negatively. When the members of geographically spaced teams cannot communicate with each other clearly, it becomes difficult to share real-time updates. A unified test management system will reduce both labor cost and production time by facilitating clear communication between the members of geographically spaced teams.

Provide a Single Framework

An organization can use a single test management system to provide a single framework to its distributed teams. In addition to facilitating clear and uninterrupted communication between the teams, the single interface will allow the teammates to upload test scripts, cases and metrics immediately. Further, the interface will provide each member with the tools required to carry out their activities. The QA managers can use the unified interface to monitor the progress of the entire development cycle by avoiding the unnecessary operations. The unified test management system makes it easier for enterprises to provide a single interface to the members of its distributed teams.

Automate the QA Initiatives

Each enterprise wants to optimize its QA initiatives by using test automation tools and frameworks. But organizations often find it a daunting challenge to automate the QA efforts in a distributed environment. A unified test management system makes it easier for enterprises to automate the software QA efforts. The offshore QA engineers can write test scripts based on the information received by them. The test scripts can further be reused to reduce the time and effort required to evaluate the software application. The unified test automation system provides a testing dashboard to users for storing the automated test cases. Thus, the existing test scripts can be reused for future projects. As the test scripts are accessible to members of the distributed, they can simply save the test scripts on their computer, and run these without writing new scripts.

With more and more companies working with distributed teams, it becomes important to use a unified test management system that allows the members to communicate and coordinate with each other without any hassle. A single test management system also allows organizations to optimize the QA process by using automated test tools and frameworks. At the same time, an organization can use the system to adopt Agile project management techniques.

You can hire testers from top software application testing companies in India who can help you accomplish testing within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide software testing services. If you would like to hire certified software testers from us, we would be glad to assist you at Mindfire Solutions.

How To Make A Developer Fix Your Bug?

Testers have a major complaint these days, which is that there are many bugs caught in the initial stages of development, but considerations for the same aren’t made on the spot. Most testers would say that it isn’t their lookout to deal with such issues, especially fixing bugs. However, as frustrating at it can be, when the efforts aren’t taken seriously, something needs to be done and someone needs to do it.

Experts say, the more you market your bugs the more would attention come through from developers around. One of the ways to catch the attention of developers is to make sure that the bug report you write is enticing enough. This would be something on the lines of advertising, in this case promoting the report of the bugs involved.

Here are a few tips on how to make a developer fix your bug

To make the bug that bugs you stand out in the special edition reports amongst all, please read on and be well-informed of the same:

• Keep it simple as well as straightforward. When the report can be repeated well and in tandem to the report you have generated, pat your back for a job well done, because the report would then be an enticing one to capture many developers’ attention or fancy.
• The report needs to be for real, and remember the bug needs to have everything to do with it in real terms, or else it wouldn’t entice the developers to come calling.
• Developers would be able to reproduce the reports better when they have more sets ups around. This is especially important when the bug which has been spoken off would be an important dependent for configuration needs.
• Nip it in the bud or go to the source, thereby pulling the root out. This is because bugs have more symptoms, not just one to make a problem happen. In such cases one should mention the issues which are very serious, for example, corruption of data as well as the description for the same in the report generated.
• The report created should be appealing, inviting along with invigorating for the attention to be caught. By saying so, exaggerating the report can be great, speaking of the possible outcomes in combination with the importance of the bug as well.
• The description of the bug should be in detail. Also, the report should be well-written, containing details about how it would affect the end user. Speak of the distress calls made by the software when the bug ran through it, along with how competition suffers when the bug plays its game.
• The report should be more of a sales ad, one that markets the bug as well as captures the attention of the developer. It is like selling the bug, wherein the buyers are developers. When you learn how to market the bugs well, getting them fixed in no time wouldn’t be a challenge to deal with.

Problems would be sporadic, say experts, and improving the logging system for the same is a must, which would then tell you where next as well as in which context the bug would appear. Then there are bugs that would only show up when systems run along with various other activities. Hence, what one needs is a load testing which would then unearth the pesky bug, bringing it to the surface.

Developers have to think of other issues on priority as well. For example, code quality issues can be there when code reviews are studied or learnt. There are also re-factoring needs along with technological as well as technical deficiencies to deal with. Such issues pose to be a challenge for product evolution in days to come, say experts. Such issues or defects ideally would be recorded in the user’s backlog. This then can be sorted out when the planning process is done well.

Most would say it isn’t the job of a tester or the developer to check for bugs or to fix it, however, they have to be due diligent at all times, in order to inform the teams of such occurrences happening over and over again. They should also possibly tell of the impacts such bugs have on the consumers, along with perfect steps that should be taken on bug reporting.

You can hire testers from top software testing companies in India who can help you accomplish testing within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide software testing services. If you would like to hire software test professionals from us, we would be glad to assist you at Mindfire Solutions.