App Performance Testing Archives

Performance Tester Salary in India

Posted on April 28, 2021 by tbsupadminnxtbackendacc

How much does a performance tester/performance engineer earn in india based on their experience and expertise? if you reached this blog seeking the answer your direction is right! Let’s have a look at performance tester salaries in India.
Let us now look at the performance tester salary of employees at present vs average expected salary in various IT hubs in India.
Performance Tester Salary in Pune
After Mumbai Pune is the second-best tech hub in the state, Pune plays a pivotal role in the growth of the IT hub in Maharashtra.
The salary packages for performance testers vary based on the city and also the size or number of organizations in the area. There are several companies in Pune with excellent opportunities for performance testers. There are more than 80+ companies are Pune that has performance testing as one of their major services.
Based on data gathered from performance testers, we are trying to compare the current as well as the expected salary of employees who are looking for a job change

Experience	Current salary	Expected salary
2-4 yrs	4-6 LPA	5-7 LPA
4-5 yrs	8-7 LPA	7-8 LPA
5-6+ yrs	7-9 LPA	10-12 LPA

Performance Tester Salary in Bangalore
Bangalore in our very own Silicon Valley, the biggest IT hub of the country. Bangalore has always been the favorite of IT-based employees owing to the salary package offered by the companies there. When it comes to performance tester salary story remains the same. Let’s have a look

Experience	Current salary	Expected salary
2-4 yrs	5.7-6.25 LPA	5.20-7.30 LPA
4-5 yrs	8.15-7.20 LPA	7-8 LPA
5-6+ yrs	7.5-9 LPA	10.5-12.5 LPA

Performance Tester Salary in Chennai
Chennai is one of the fast-growing and one of the biggest IT hubs in South India. Today Chennai is home to many big companies and well-known IT parks of the country including Elcot SEZ, Tidel Park, MEPS, Ramanujan IT Park, Mahindra World City, ASV Suntech Park, RMZ Millenia, and many more.
Chennai is the right place to be if you are a fresher. The place offers a decent package as well as a fertile ground for budding performance testers. Let’s have a look at the salary disparities.

Experience	Current salary	Expected salary
2-4 yrs	5.1-5.25 LPA	5.3-6.30 LPA
4-5 yrs	6.75-7 LPA	7.2-8.3 LPA
5-6+ yrs	7.5-9 LPA	10.5-12.5 LPA

Performance Tester Salary in Hyderabad
Another upcoming IT hub of South India is Hyderabad which is locally also called Cyberabad for obvious reasons. There are many IT hubs created in the area for the promotions of IT Infrastructure.
At present Hyderabad is home to many well-known names in IT including Google, Microsoft, GE, Qualcomm, Facebook, Amazon, and more. This list itself speaks volumes of the opportunities available in the region for every IT professional.

Also Read: Salary of testers in various countries revealed

Let’s have a look at the current average salary employees are drawing vs the expected average salary of performance testers

Experience	Current salary	Expected salary
2-4 yrs	3.7-5.8 LPA	5-7 LPA
4-5 yrs	6.5-8 LPA	7-8 LPA
5-6+ yrs	7-9 LPA	8-10 LPA

Performance Tester Salary in Mumbai
Mumbai! the name says it all. It’s a known fact that Mumbai is indeed one of the most prominent tech hubs in India. The salary package offered by various companies dwindles drastically owing to the budget variances of the company located there. From MNCs and here is what we got to know from the survey we conducted from performance testers working in Mumbai.

Experience	Current salary	Expected salary
2-4 yrs	4.20 -5.8 LPA	5-6.5 LPA
4-5 yrs	6.05-7 LPA	6-7 LPA
5-6+ yrs	8-8.5 LPA	9-11 LPA

Conclusion
Hope the idea about performance tester salary in India is clear now. It’s expected that the role of a performance tester to performance engineer will happen widely across the dev world soon.

Load Testing vs Stress Testing: What’s the difference?

Posted on April 13, 2020 by tbsupadminnxtbackendacc

Load Testing vs Stress Testing what’s the striking differences between both the process?
In the following sections, we will discuss in detail load and stress testing. People often get confused between these 2 and refer to them as a load and stress test. But there are fundamental differences between these 2 performance tests, as we will discuss in the upcoming sections. These are the 2 most important performance tests that you may wish to see the results for before your product or application goes live. This is especially true for applications that are connected to the internet.
Load Testing
As the name suggests, in a load test, many users are loaded into the system or application, and then the transactions are performed to see how well they work. Load test gives you an idea of how your application would perform in the real world with “n” numbers of users (referred to as the load) active in the system.
The results of a load test are generally expressed in terms of TPS or transactions per second. This means the system can process “N” transactions per second with an active user load of “X” thousand. The value for “N” and “X” needs to be defined by the business based on the expected number of users and the infrastructure you have in place to handle this load.

Stress Testing
In Stress testing, the system is put under stress and then its performance is measured. It is used to verify the stability and reliability of the system under stress. It is also done to ensure the system does not crash at any point.
Considering your application can handle 1o0 concurrent users. In a stress test, you may start by having 100 or more users in the system performing data transactions. Slowly you would stress the system by either increasing the load or having more transactions performed. Then you would monitor how your application is performing in this stressed situation. The stress test is also performed to understand at which point your system is likely to crash or break.

Major Differences between Load and Stress Testing?
Here are some major differentiation points between load and stress testing.

Sno	Load Testing	Stress Testing
1	It is used to check the performance/functionality of the system under load (multiple active users)	It is used to test the reliability of the system under stress or extreme load
2	The load is set up with multiple active users – virtual or real – inserted into the system	Stress is created by creating more users, data, and transactions in the system
3	Load test helps to identify the upper limit of the users that the system can handle.	A stress test is used to understand the behavior and reliability of the system under extreme load or stress.
4	The performance of the app is measured with load in the system	The reliability and stability of the system is measured under extreme load or stress
5	Some of the load testing tools are Jmeter, NeoLoad, Headspin, Experitest, etc	Some tools recommended for stress testing are Stress Testers, Jmeter, NeoLoad

Examples of load and stress testing
To better understand the difference between load and stress testing, let us look at an example. Let us take an example of an online shopping site. Assuming that your application is designed to handle 1000 concurrent users. When you do a load test, you may want to start with a 50% load. So, you set up your systems to simulate 500 users and then check how the system responds by checking the API response times. If the response time is within acceptable limits, you progressively increase the load to 700, 800, 900, and 1000 to see how your application performs under the different loads.
For the same application, if you were to do a stress test, you will 1000+ users simultaneously generating calling multiple APIs. This will stress out the system which is designed to handle only 1000 users. The reliability of the system is then checked by checking the correctness of the API response, to check if the application or pages crash at any point, the data is saved to and from the database, etc.
Some other examples of load testing are sending multiple files for printing at the same time to the printer, sending thousands of emails at a time to load the mail server, or changing large volumes of data in a word or excel or any other processing system.
Some scenarios that emphasize the need for a stress test are an educational website at the time of result declaration, or eCommerce website during their annual sales or new and anticipated product launches, or the latest vaccination availability and booking apps as well.

Wish to know about the best performance testing tools in the market? Read here!

Performance testing includes various types of testing including Load, Stress, and others. A performance test is done to validate the reliability and stability of the system, ensure the response time is within the defined SLA, and also ensure that the system is scalable.
Load test only concentrates on the performance of the application or system with many active users or with a load. Hence, Load testing can be considered as a subset of the performance test.
What is the purpose of load testing?
The main purpose of Load testing is to understand, how the system would perform under the real-life load. For this, the business first needs to analyze the expected user base for the application. Then a load similar to that number is simulated and the performance of the system is measured. The results are normally mentioned as successful transactions per second under “X” load or “X” active users.
It is very helpful in understanding the achievable performance of business-critical transactions along with resource utilization. Based on the load test result, the business decides to scale up or scale down the backend infrastructure.

What are the different types of load and stress testing?
Load testing can be further divided into 4 different categories based on the load used. These are

Load Testing: Here you simply check the performance of the system under different levels of load which are well within the expected load limits.
Capacity Testing: Also called scalability testing capacity testing is mainly done to identify the maximum load the system and the infrastructure can take without breaking down or without breaching the SLA.
Stress Testing: It is done to find out how the system performs under stress or extreme load. This is achieved by reducing the infrastructure, reducing the database size along increasing the load many folds.
Soak Testing: It is a long-form of load testing where system performance or degradation in performance is monitored over a long duration.

How are load and stress testing done?
Every application or system will have a limit to the load it can handle at a particular time. This limit is decided by the size of the database and servers used. Both in load and stress testing, load or stress in the system is simulated using real users or using tools.
Load testing is done with real users and with simulated users as well. When real users are used, due to the limitation to the number of users available to database, servers, and other infrastructures are scaled down to create a load on the system. Then the testing is performed and the response times are calculated. The results are then extrapolated to derive the performance numbers for the actual infrastructure. When tools are used, any number of users can be simulated, so the actual infrastructure is tested.
Stress testing can be performed only with the help of tools. Here the system is put under stress by having inserting users many-folds than the expected told, or by putting stress on the DB and servers with many transactions and API calls. The aim is to check the stability and reliability of the system under extreme load. It also helps to identify the point at which the system is likely to crash. Based on the results of the load and stress testing, the business may decide to scale up the infrastructure for better application performance and reduced downtimes.
What are the goals of load and stress testing?
The goal of load and stress testing in to find the performance defects in the application and in the infrastructure or network that can affect the application.
The main goals of load testing are:

To ensure that under different permissible the response time for all the transactions is within the SLA (Service Level Agreement) as fixed by the business.
To measure the performance of different application modules under different loads.
To measure the network latency and other components that can impact the response time.
To uncover application design issues that can reduce the performance.
To check the server configurations for web and application to ensure they can handle the load.

The main goals of stress testing are:

To uncover issues that occur only at extreme load conditions.
To check the stability and reliability of the application under heavy load.
To uncover synchronizations issues, memory leaks, and race conditions
Optimizing the system to prevent a breakdown in production.
Planning for the scalability and best utilization of the available infrastructure.

Do you know that volume testing is absolutely needed before app release? Read more

Soak Testing is a type of Performance Testing where the performance of the system under load is analyzed for long-duration similar to a production scenario. Some applications need to be online 24/7 like the eCommerce websites. They may have a different load at different points, a soak test would put the system under test with a specific or varying load and monitor its performance for hours or even days.
A soak test aims to identify issues that occur only after the system has been active for long durations. The most common issue identified in a soak test is related to memory leaks where the system starts degrading after being live for a long time.
Conclusion
The performance of a software application is critical to the success of the application. For this purpose after the functional testing, performance tests are performed. The most common performance tests are load and stress tests. Based on the results of the load and stress test the business decides on the infrastructure needed to support the application.
The load and stress result thus play a very important part not only in the success of the application but also helps business in optimizing resource utilization and improved profit.

How to Test a Social Media Application?

Posted on June 4, 2019 by tbsupadminnxtbackendacc

Social media apps have literally become the lifeline of the present generation.

Social media apps are now a podium

to connect with people,
for entertainment purposes,
do business,
find or offer jobs,
get some information and whatnot.

Apart from its benefits, social media apps could also be very harmful. These apps could lead to high-security breaches if they are not properly validated for their security.
Apart from this improper functioning of these apps in any aspect could affect the business of thousands of people depending upon these apps for their business needs.
Hence Proper Testing of Social Media applications is very important.
Here is a sneak peek into how to test social media apps.
Why is it important to Test Social Media?
.

According to Statista – “Number of worldwide users is expected to reach some 3.02 billion monthly active social media users by 2021.”
Such a large podium definitely needs to be secure and provide a seamless experience to all its users. Hence it is very important to test these applications for their efficient and effective working.
Types of Social Media Testing
Social media is a bundle of various functionalities. Testing social media apps requires you to have extensive domain expertise, large experience, and the correct skillset for it. Testing of Social media applications includes:

Enterprise Software Testing: Social media applications serve a large number of people and are very robust to test and require a high level of security testing. Hence these applications require some high-end enterprise testing solutions to be tested.
Web 2.0 testing: Being a web 2.0 based application, testing of social media applications requires the early involvement of testers. These applications are also susceptible to frequent changes and hence automatization of the test cases for such applications is preferred.
Web-testing including compatibility, functional, Security Testing, Performance Testing and database testing needs to be done for social media apps.
SaaS Testing: SaaS is referred to software as a service model. Social media services follow the Saas model and are requires to be validated for proper functioning using SaaS testing.
Web Analytics Testing: Social media apps deal with a large amount of data, Web analytics testing helps in collecting of website data and then analyzing and reporting based on your user’s targets.
User Acceptance Testing: includes testing social media apps for its attractiveness and user-friendly nature.
Content Management testing: Content management testing validate that the content is appropriate for the audience. Social media applications like Facebook are an ocean of content, new content is posted every now and then, and hence, content management testing becomes an on-going task and is very important to avoid any content related issues.
SEO testing: SEO is the need for the hour to promote your websites/applications online. Hence SEO testing becomes very important to ensure proper growth and exposure of your social media application.
Online Advertisement application testing. Social media applications these days promote businesses using online advertisement. Validating the proper functioning of online advertisements is very important.

Also Read: How To Test a Mobile Application

Social Media Application Testing Life Cycle

To ensure that your social media testing goes well, follow a proper testing methodology. Here are the steps you can follow to ensure proper testing of your social media apps.
1. Analyze Test Requirements:
First and foremost step if to analyze test requirements. Determine the scope of the testing and the test objectives.
Make a list of what all you need to test, how much time and how many resources you will require for testing.
2. Test Plan Creation:
Test plan creation is the next step towards conducting successful social media application testing.
Test planning is dependent on what does tester’s aim to achieve from the testing.
Hence they should have a clear understanding of what they are supposed to test like are they supposed to carry out only front-end testing or back-end testing or the both.

3. Allocation of Resources for Testing:
As per your analysis in test requirement phase, allocate resources for the testing like the human resources, allocate the time for testing, etc.
Before starting testing your social media mobile app, you should shortlist the testing techniques -Functional and Non-functional.

Also make a note of network, operating system, and device platforms for functional testing.
For Non-Functional Testing, techniques select from various testing techniques like Performance Testing, Usability Testing, Adaptability Testing, and Security Testing.
4. Test Case Document:
This is the first step towards actual testing.
Create test cases based on the test plan created by you in the initial phases of testing.
Create a test case document with all the features and functionalities of your social media app.
The test cases should include all the functional test cases along with various other test cases for usability testing, adaptability testing and other test cases like testing the speed of the app, memory usage, battery usage, and data requirements.
5. Defining the alliance of Manual Testing and Automation Testing.
Testing of social media apps includes an amalgamation of both manual and automatic testing. Prepare a separate document for manual testing test cases and automatic testing test scripts.
6. Execution of the Test Case:
The actual testing takes place here, where you will actually execute the test cases created in the previous step. You can execute test cases and scripts in physical devices or using testing tools, or in the cloud.
7. Identifying and Removing the Bugs:
While executing the test cases, all the bugs that are detected have to be reported to the development team, for removing them.
8. Documentation:
Document all the bugs that you have found. This documentation can help you as a reference for future testing.
9. Test Completion:
After bug’s removal, the application has to be retested to check if the bugs are properly removed and to check that the change in code has not affected the present functionalities.
Though there is nothing like test completion, as the application may require to be repeatedly tested whenever there is any code change.
But if in any round of testing, the code is identified as bug-free, the testing is considered to be completed.
Tips for Testing Social Media Applications
Here are a few tips to test your social media application effectively:

Testers should be experienced in the design and implementation of Web 2.0 testing
Carry out all-inclusive website testing.
Autonomous validation is important for social media apps.

Conclusion
Social media applications are witnessing a sudden hike. People are getting dependent on them for their day to day enquires and uses.

Such a wide platform requires to be tested comprehensively so that they possess no threats to their users either at a personal or professional level.

23 Incredible Load Testing Tools For Web and Mobile Apps

Posted on May 7, 2018 by tbsupadminnxtbackendacc

Developers require load testing tools to promptly hunt down bugs and performance problems to make things operate easily. The tools guarantee an application performance is optimized and maximized during peak traffic and severe stress situations.

The Free and Commercial Top 23 Load Testing Tools are as follows:

1. Apache JMeter

A pure Java, open source application utilized to test performance on both dynamic and static resources.
Simulates heavy loads on groups of servers, individual servers, networks, or objects to examine the strength and analyze execution under various load types.
Applied to test web apps, FTP, SOAP & REST web services, databases etc.
Several commercial tools support JMeter

2. WebLOAD

The tool of choice for enterprises with heavy user load and complex testing requirements.
It’s flexible and easyto use.
Enable you to instantlyspecify the tests you require with features such as automatic correlation, DOM-based recording/playback, and JavaScript scripting language.
Supports technologies – from enterprise applications to web protocols.
Has built-in integration with Selenium, Jenkins, and many more.

3. Tsung

A free open source software launched under GPLv2 licensefor performance testing that works on multiple protocols.
Utilized to accentuate HTTP, WebDAV, LDAP, MySQL and various other servers.
Many IP addresses are opened on one device employing their OS IP Aliasing.
Response time can be estimated while loading by producing HTML reports.

4. NeoLoad

An innovative load testing tool created to 10X times faster automate test design, analysis, and maintenance for DevOps and Agile teams.
Integration with CI servers for motorized test runtime.
Analyses user paths to detect newer path versions to evade flaws.

5. Rational Performance Tester

Developed by IBM Corporation which is performance test production, and analysis tool.
Supports development team to approve the reliability and scalability of web-based platforms before deployment into the formulation.
Event and scheduled based testing.
No coding needed.
Real-time reporting for instant execution problem identification.

6. Loadster

A desktop-based high-level HTTP load testing tool.
The web browser can be utilized to record the easy to use scripts.
Using the GUI you can even transform the basic script with powerful variables to verify the response.
HTML report is created to analyze the performance of your application.
Best to detect the execution bottlenecks in the application.

7. Appvance

The first consolidated software test automation tool which reduces the redundancies built by old siloed QA tools that hinder DevOps teams.
Detects bugs the user would notice on their browsers and mobile applications.
Incorporates a different level of regularity in their record and perform script production.
Data-driven is possible for whatever language you use.

8. Cloud Test

A cloud-based load testing tool which fast-tracks load testing scenario and works with speed that is affordable and scalable.
Analyze and control the performance of mobile apps, web applications, and APIs.
Extricate the report in your preferred format to locate the system’s performance loopholes.

9. Load Impact

An on-demand and automatic performance testing tool for DevOps.
Fairly efficient for testing any protocol- a web app or API or mobile app or website.
Offers a powerful Lua scripting setting permitting you to generate complex or simple API scenarios.
Correlates you with performance trending analytics and reports via webhook

10. Grinder

A load testing system accessible under the BSD-style open-source license that too for free, operating on Java platform.
Simple to operate a distributed test which can be done by utilizing multiple load injector machines.
Pre-built Java libraries with a wide range of protocols and frameworks are possible.
Test scripts can be written in Jython and Clojure.

11. Load UI Pro

LoadUI Pro by Smartbear lets you instantly generate script-less complicated load tests, publish them on the cloud utilizing load agents and control server’s performance on increasing the load on them.
Enables reuse of subsisting SoapUI Pro functional tests.
Preconfigured test templates such as baseline, spike, stress, and smoke.

12. Httperf

An open Source HTTP load generator for regulating web server performance promoting the construction of both micro and macro- level benchmarks.
Creates and maintains server overloads.
Tests standard HTTP payload of the application.

13. Gatling

Open-source framework created using Scala, Akka&Netty.
Creates precise results that can be observed progressively and can be exported later for review.
Drastically diminishes the debugging time period.

14. WAPT

An affordable, simple-to-use stress and load testing tool.
Can test any website comprising of mobile sites, web portals, and business applications.

15. HPE Load Runner

An end-to-end framework performance to recognize and resolve problems before application launch.
Sustains wide array of applications to reduce skill and time.
Consolidates with development tools like jUnit, IDE etc.

16. Testing Anywhere

An automated testing tool with built-in intelligence to test the execution of any web application, website, or other objects.
Script-less software supporting innumerable testing feasibilities.

17. StresStimulus

Automatically settles playback errors due to its exclusive autocorrelation.
Reports traffic for mobile operators- Android, Apple, Windows,and
Advances several Enterprise applications SharePoint, CRM, Silverlight etc.
Serves as a stand-alone add-on tool.

18. OpenSTA

A free GUI-based load testing tool built for proficient testing users.
Proficient in delivering the heavy load test and review for the scripted HTTP and HTTPS.
Uses easy recordings to make load tests and generates statistics after performing them.

19. LoadComplete

A desktop tool employed for load testing of web applications, providing stats on their stress, scalability, and performance.
Records user interactions to build tests and assume these actions with many virtual users.
Gives exact test analysis report after every test.

20. Locust

An Open Source load testing tool which allows determining user behavior utilizing Python.
Permits testing on any system, and various systems simultaneously.

21. Loader

A free cloud-based service to test the web application supporting stress and load by building thousands of concurrent connections.
Monitor your application response in real-time in the mode of readable charts and graphs.

22. QEngine (ManageEngine)

A most typical and easy automated testing tool for performance and load testing of your web applications.
Manages performance leakages in web services or sites.
Capable to conduct remote testing of web services from any geographical area.

23. Silk Performer

Designed to provide a consistent user experience and unlimited cloud assistance for load testing anywhere, anytime, on any device.
Serves purpose for low bandwidth users.

A Quick Guide To Load Testing: Why is it Crucial For Your Mobile App?

Posted on April 25, 2018 by tbsupadminnxtbackendacc

The app that you are about to launch lately is not just a product. It holds the beacon of your company.

It has been estimated that 26% of the app that has been download from various app stores are uninstalled within an hour itself.

So how do you ensure, that your app does not suffer the same fate?

Performance!

What better way to test it than performing a load test on your app.

Let’s have a look at it in detail.

Load Testing – What is it?

Load testing process involves artificially creating various load environments for your app, so that the performance of your app will be monitored closely to determine it is stable or not.

How is it Performed?

Check the Parameters and Creating a Work Load Model

First of all there are certain parameters that need to considered before the test begins. They are,

Response Time:

The time in which your app responds to certain inputs

Communication Rate:

Rate at which the software can send and receive requests

Resource Utilization:

While performing the test it has to be closely monitored that how much load the system is taking while interacting with the app.

User Load:

Concurrent user load the app can withstand

The Work Load Model

A work load model will make sure that the app is being injected with correct load parameters at different point of time.

For better understanding here is the detailed video regarding how to construct a work load model.

The test is basically done in definite intervals,

Exactly like that of the diagram below

Creating The Test Cases

While creating test cases it has to be kept in mind that expected result should have a fail or pass section for marking as it would be useful later.

While creating test cases make sure that,

Actions and scenarios of the testing procedure
Customise the test case for various inputs
Replay test cases for verifying the simulation

Execution of Test

When you run the test make sure that the load is increased slowly against the user profile. Between tests make sure that the system has enough breathing time so that it can stabilize. Last but not least, while incrementing make sure that the output of the app is being monitored and recorded.

Slow increase of the load will make sure that the threshold point of the app is marked well.

It is important that the load test is performed in cycles so that each cycle should have a load increment. After each analysis results should be verified and analysed.

Report Analysis:

Indentifying the hindrance for the good performance of any app application is an art. For effective analysis a well experienced testing engineer or the help of

an established software testing company is required as it requires chart analysis and various other forms of mathematical data interpretation.

The result obtained should be compared to that of respective industrial standard benchmark.

Benefits of Performing Load Test on Mobile Apps

All the functions of the app can be validated
Speed accuracy and stability of a app can be measured
User experience can be guaranteed once the app is deployed
Issues can be rectified before the deployment
Load capability can be improved

Factors That Need To Be Checked While Performing Load Test On Apps

First of all performance of the app should be impeccable and for that to happen these factors has to be perfect.

App Loading time
Power consumption
Memory consumption
Hardware /software integration
Integration with other apps
How app behaves if its retrieved from background

API/ Server Interaction

While an app interacts with Server via API these factors needs to be checked

Data transfer between app and the server
Number of app calls generated to the server
Server switch time

Network Performance

Delay time in receiving information from network
In case of packet loss, the request to the server should be resend
Network speed

Challenges That Can Come Up in Performing Load Test

Since Mobile phone comes in various size, shape and OS it’s hard to organize them
Device fragmentation
Different app types such as native, web app and hybrid app
Security of cloud server which performs testing

Reliable Tools Used For Load Testing Apps

Jmeter:

An open source modular GUI oriented tool that’s out to use the most now

Gatling:

Written in Scala based DSL the tool has been download over million times

Locust:

Written in Python the tool is developer friendly tool renowned for its user friendliness

How Do You Test Application Scalability

Posted on November 9, 2017 by tbsupadminnxtbackendacc

Are you aware of the various factors that must be checked for the scalability of your app? As you can understand by its name, application scalability is how much you will scale the product with the increased workload. To make you understand better, suppose the users of your system increase by 2 times the load it can take, you will have to increase the server performance and lessen the server response time for a good UI experience.

Scalability testing is your answer to all the woes. It defines of the common problems like:

How is the server performing when the hardware and software are changed?
In that case, can we upgrade the system’s capability and increase productivity?

The Need for Scalable Testing
Why do you need a scalability test? Well, the answer is clear. It helps you determine how your application performed with increased load and helps you understand the total number of users it can withstand. The reason behind this is to understand at what point the systems starts lagging and what can be done to overcome such challenges.
How to Create a Scalability Test
Scalability testing is performed by conducting a series of load tests with complementary hardware and software changes made while keeping the other conditions same. It tests for various attributes as below:

System throughput
Network/Memory Usage
Performance measurement
Load with a number of users using the application
Screen Transition
Request and response time
Hits/Transactions per second

The scalability test should be performed systematically to ensure that all the attributes are covered and the data is collected. Obviously, the type of load may differ for each system depending upon its web server, users and type of system. Think about all the other parameters that might get affected when load increases.
Essential Requirements for Conducting the Scalability Test
Clear and concise requirements before the tests are performed is a basic necessity. The pre-requisites for scalability testing includes:
Memory: Evaluate the need for memory allocation for all the virtual users using the system
Processor: Check the requirements of the processor before you start
Operating System: Check which OS acts as an agent and tests the load
Load distribution capability: Make sure you have a centralized system where all the results are collected and evaluated from multiple users and machines.
Steps to Create a Scalability Test

1. Create and monitor all the scenarios
Try changing the scenarios and check the attributes that get affected due to the change
Re-check the scenario to make sure they perform the same way each time
Define a set of virtual users for the testing system
Create the load test by specifying settings that allow you to evaluate the application’s performance
Run your tests
If any lags, make changes to the server and run repeat the tests.

Analysing the Test Results
By running the test cases, you are actually just determining 40% of your performance testing objective. The critical part of this being the analyses and rectification of results. The scalability testing results can be compared and analysed in the following manner:
1. Virtual Users vs Response time
Some companies set a specific time interval, say for 2 minutes, in which they increase the number of users for a specific server load and test the behaviour of the application. In short, you will be testing the applications response time for a specified number of users.
2. Users vs Latency
This analysis is done to check the latency of the network on which the users operate.
3. Hits vs users
Hits per second are observed after 3 minutes of response and latency time starts.
4. Users vs errors
The load on the system giving rise to errors and bugs are tracked against a specific number of persons.

Conclusion:
Once the scalability testing has ended, whatever the outcomes are, make sure you have all the data recorded for further enhancing the load capacity of the system at any given time. It is always a good practise to have a backup in plan for the tests. Meaningful reference is essential for the next time you perform the same tests.

11 Guidelines for Mobile App Performance Testing

Posted on June 30, 2017 by tbsupadminnxtbackendacc

Performance testing services is done to provide information about apps regarding speed, stability, reliability and scalability. It also determines speed & degradation of systems with different configurations under both controlled and uncontrolled standards. More importantly, it unfolds what needs to be improved within an app before the product is launched in the market.

The General Guidelines for Performance Testing
The methodology for software performance testing can vary in different steps, but the objective of the whole process remains the same. The following are the list of general guidelines for performance testing of mobile apps:
1) Plan for Test: Once we are ready for a test, we need to have a proper planning and check for available resources. The performance test plan should describe the overall strategy for testing the complete mobile app.
2) Identification of Testing Environment: While testing, it is important to identify the software, hardware, tools and network configurations. This will allow the design and development team to identify the performance test errors at an early stage.
Different types of testing environment:
a) Replica of production system
b) Actual production system
c) Production system with less number of servers of low specifications
d) Production system with less number of servers of same specifications
3) Define Necessary Formats for Displaying System Usage: Necessary formats need to be defined for measuring the performance of an application. Some of the possible formats are:

Task Distribution Diagram: This gives information on the number of users for a particular process and the time taken to load. The peak and off usages are determined through this.
Transaction Profile Sheet: This provides information about the transaction names, a summary of a number of transactions at a particular point of time, screen navigation, etc.
User Profile Diagram: This depicts the user load time and pages accessed by the users

4) Deciding what to test first: The following are some criteria for decision-making about which process to be tested first. It is a very important step as it guides the total performance testing process.
·         Processes having the highest business risks are tested
·         Processes that are most frequently used are tested
·         Applications’ peak usage hours of the day are analysed
·         Peak days of the month, quarter, and year
·         Processes that are linked
·         Processes which are resource intensive
5) Documenting: The purpose of documenting the process is to obtain information necessary to create virtual users such as:
·         User Actions
·         Expected results of each action
·         Input data fields
·         Valid data for input
Identifying these properties shall give a clear scope of performance test against each user action.

6) Establish which data to use: Before starting, it’s important to establish the data to be used. Any real-time data can also be imported from the development servers and the same is used to analyse results and reports.
7) Define what resources are to be tested: Performance testing involves defining the resources that are involved in testing. This includes app servers like WebSphere, Weblogic, Tomcat, IIS Server; database server like DB2, Oracle and network resources. These resources form the total system and therefore defining them is critical.
8) Performance testing should be done after functional testing: There is no question of doing performance testing when functional testing is not done. Functional testing confirms the working of the system as expected with all aspects of the UI, multilingual navigation, navigation between pages and off-site, etc.
9) Done at the time of system-testing phase: System testing is a phase of software testing in which the complete system is tested. So, performance testing should be taken up during system testing phase only.
10) Tools should be identified: There are plenty of tools available for doing performance testing. But, we need to identify tools that may be useful for system testing.
11) Execution and Communicating Results: Once the performance testing is completed, we need to summarize the findings and test results. Later, it is distributed to respective resource owners for making corrections if any.
Once the corrective measures/fixes are done, the entire tests need to be repeated and the final summary report is taken.
Conclusion
While an inclusive performance testing strategy will continue to kill bugs for all tech innovations, this will certainly help you to bring the best out of your testing efforts. With perspectives and tools emerging each day, testers need to leverage on this testing mechanism for their mobile app testing services.

8 Formidable Challenges While Testing an Online Banking Application

Posted on June 13, 2017 by tbsupadminnxtbackendacc

Being the most complex and advanced enterprise solution, banking applications needs to be carefully considered in both functional as well as security aspects to ensure that customers and assets are protected from malware.

Internet-based electronic banking or online banking applications have become a necessity for customers. As a countless number of banking transactions happens every day, these apps need to have high level performance, with features that meets the needs of a customer.
Few things that should be noted to constitute a consistent, bug-free, banking application:

The app needs a solid reporting system to keep track on daily transactions
Strong auditing is required to troubleshoot issues
It should have the capacity to adhere complex and advanced work flows
Banking apps should have the feature of integration with other apps such as Trading accounts and Bill-pay utility accounts
It should possess multi-tier functionality to support multiple user sessions

In this blog, we go through the key challenges faced while testing a Banking Application:
1) Strict Security Regulation: It is necessary for banking applications to protect customer data and private information as well as the assets. Therefore, during mobile software testing, these things should be considered by providing a secure testing environment.
A banking app should be compatible with all operating systems, versions, devices etc. Along with iOS and Android, other versions including Blackberry and WP8 also need to be tested. Mobile testing tools that support both native and web properties should be used for wide usage.
To ensure that the software doesn’t have any flaws, the QA team needs to check both negative as well as positive sides of the system and report it before any unauthorized access happens. The bank should also use other security measures like an access validation code or one-time password for better safety. For security regulation testing, automation tools like HPWebInspect and IBM AppScan should be used and for manual testing- Paros proxy, Proxy Sniffer, HTTP watch etc. should be put to use.
2) Complex Data: This is one of the major challenges that can occur while testing a bank application. No apps can en sure that the back-end databases of bank system will not be affected by malware or all the data within is protected. So, it is necessary that the mobile testers need to have a pool of accounts that can be used for the testing solutions.
A bank definitely needs to have an automation tool to constantly check database connectivity and logical functions. It should be done over the virtual private network (VPN) to assure safety on its private data.
3) Active Support of Devices: About 80% of people spend their time on using mobile applications. Mobile manufacturers introduce new features on a daily basis to provide customers a better and friendly user experience. Similarly, banking apps also need to bring in revisions to offer a better experience on latest devices.
4) Privacy is Essential: Privacy plays a very important role in mobile banking. This feature defines how much secure a mobile banking app is for its users. Therefore, automated testing must be done for every single update to ensure protection for all private information. It is essential for a bank to have an automated tool system that run tests periodically without the need for a software tester to manually test each function within the app.

5) Real-time Activity: Apps should have the capacity to provide real-time updates and this is more challenging when it deals with network connectivity issues.
6) Proper Testing and Development: Bugs can affect any application and this is the reason your banking app should follow proper app testing procedure. Making a banking application with user-friendly functioning and proper security checks require extensive revision and software testing.
7) Updated Market Trends: Consumer requirements and market trends keep changing invariably. Therefore, application features, usability etc. have to be revised and kept updated.
8) Performance Failures: Performance levels involve connectivity, infrastructure, and back-end integration. The transaction happening through the apps should be monitored at regular intervals. Also, Load and Stress tests must be performed regularly to ensure multiple support transactions on anytime.
Best Practices
A few best practices that will help you manage certain challenges in testing banking applications are:

A clearly defined methodology of software performance testing
Testing that encompasses the complete work flow
Testing for functionality, performance and security
Testing of the app for UX, UI, data integrity and support multiple users

Testing banking applications can be a complicated deal, but if the key methods and principles are placed right, then it can be beneficial with long-lasting advantages. The right blend of testers and processes are key factors of a successful mobile banking app.