The use of mobile devices has increased in the last few decades as they are available with scads of functionalities and at a reasonable price. Even they have become more powerful than a PC.
As the use of mobile devices has been increasing, so as the demand for high performing applications. To attain these demands applications are needed to be tested properly. Post-development, the only way to achieve it is by testing the application as per the documentation.
Testing is carried out to ensure usability, consistency, security and mobility of applications.
We have discussed some challenges faced in automation mobile testing with respective probable solutions.
GUI testing: Graphic user interface, it is what a user sees when the application is accessed. GUI testing is the testing of display of contents of the application on different devices, i.e.testing the display of functionalities like menus, font size, check box, images, buttons, acceptance of numbers and characters etc.
Challenge: During running and re-running the test cases(regression testing), sometimes the GUI keeps on changing frequently, making it difficult to recognise whether the change is a bug or just an enhancement.
Solution: Sticking to the GUI documentation and performing the test according to the GUI documentation. You can also try froglogic to attain the best results.
Security testing: This process focuses on security aspects like authorization, encryptions, authentication, points of entry, vulnerabilities against virus attacks, data security and privacy thereby ensuring app security. It detects security flaws in source code.
Challenge: Encryption of entered data to mobile from web service or other web applications.
While using the application, unwanted data gets stored resulting in unnecessary memory use.
Solution: Using some automation testing tools like Testsigma. This is one of the most powerful automation testing tools which makes the whole testing process easy and less time-consuming.
Performance and reliability automation testing: Using the available resources to check the performance and reliability. It depends on the device resources, size of device, device operational mode, cost, quality of connectivity and variability.
Challenges: Testing the backup time of battery: Increasing the backup time of battery while using an application. The amount of battery an app uses for a specific period, if it uses an excessive battery, may lead to overheating of the mobile.
App Start-Up: The time taken by the application to show up after tapping on it. If the time taken is between 1-2 secs (or the loading time mentioned in the document)after taping, it's fine else not. This delay is because of cache or RAM.
Solution: Modifying source code to reduce time consumption.
Testing for other apps in the background: The application under test should function the way it should when run parallelly with other applications.
If the application does not function properly parallelly with other apps, there is a possibility that a user may lose his data.
Network performance: The performance of the app when connected with different networks.
Challenges:
Jitter tests: The delay in receiving information when connected to a network is known as jitter. Information transmission happens in the form of packets. During a poor connection or no connection, the usual data flow gets interrupted and it follows a dissimilar path from sender to receiver. So the mobile should be well equipped to handle those
unorganised data.
Solution: Performing jitter test in automation testing platform. Letting the user know through an appropriate notification to waiting till the system responds again.
Network Speed: The application under test should be tested on different networks with different speeds including a wifi network. The behaviour of the app should be closely monitored when there is a switch in the network. Networks should be 3G, 4G, 5G.
Unresponsiveness of applications: This happens due to a lack of resources for the application to function. Sometimes the app freezes. In some cases, it restarts, because the mobile needs to free up memory to function.
Solution: Optimization of source code of the application.
Testing an application for universal usage: Testing an app on a universal level is required because of the use of mobile phones and applications universally. Testing the application concerning the functionalities like language, time zone according to area.
Fragmentation: There is a wide range of fragmentation in mobile phones like OS and screen size fragmentation, device fragmentation, manufacturer fragmentation etc. The greatest challenge faced is testing the application for all these fragmentation factors.
The up-gradation of OS versions in iOS and android demands the applications to be tested for an upgrade as well as older versions. The number of devices is growing and so as the fragmentation factors. So the more we focus on these factors the better user experience will be the outcome.
Testsigma, a well-equipped platform to carry out mobile automation testing smoothly.
Happy Testing!