With today’s customers becoming more tech-savvy and sophisticated, the software businesses are becoming extremely competitive where quality is a critical factor for software projects/products and customers. Today, projects run behind schedule because of multiple factors that include requirements changing so rapidly. The quality of the project/product is determined by other factors like the skill set of team members, software processes quality produced with the effectiveness of software testing determined by the quality of user testing processes.
Functional testing refers to the process of testing the interface between the app and the remaining setup, i.e. the system and users, which is a crucial aspect of software development. Why? Well, functional testing is how one makes sure that the product works as intended.
Now that we understand what functional testing is about and the value it contributes to the development process, it is now time to take a look at the steps that are vital for the process as well as the best practices one can adopt for each of these steps/stages of functional testing.
- Test requirements gathering: The process starts with collating an extensive list of test requirements. Here, experts advise that companies first ensure all stakeholders receive an induction from the business team to introduce the organization to the product, the target market, and the kind of users for whom the app is being designed. It would also be a od id keep a close eye on changes to the requirements and ensure corresponding changes/updates are also made to relevant factors such as test cases.
- Test planning: Now, one must put together a plan for functional testing: to do that effectively, it is best to ensure approved traceability matrices. In addition to that, it would also be advisable to minimize any functional gaps in the test plans.
- Test strategy: A key best practice for this stage is to put together a combined functional test coverage matrix that includes the different test cases the team intends to execute.
- Test execution: The next step is to execute the strategy one has put together foto perform the software’s functional testingAt this point, it would be a good idea to make sure to set up a formal process to receive intermediate product builds before the QA process kicks in. It would also do you well to let go of any rigidity in terms of the execution: agility and flexibility in execution will come in handy in case there are any changes to the plan.
- Defect management: As the name suggests, this step deals with bugs and issues in the software. For defect management, then, testers must retain focus on the bigger, more important functional defects instead of focusing on more cosmetic defects. This is especially important when the test cycle has just been initiated.
- Test results reporting: One of the most important things to do at this point is to prepare an extensive test report template. Also, make sure that the summary report includes the overall summary of all test cases used along with the efforts dedicated to testing every feature and stage of the app.
- Test metrics collection: To ensure high levels of efficacy at the final step of the testing process, it is vital to, first, determine processes as well as the product metrics that you intend to monitor regularly.
There you have it ladies and gentlemen, a quick but impactful overview of functional testing in the development process. While a seemingly extensive process, you can rest assured that functional testing is the leading way to assure the company, the developers, and the target users that the app functions as intended and offers all the features and conveniences it has been designed to offer. And don’t forget to use the functional testing strategy best practices listed above to achieve intended results.
