Quality in 2019, a personal view of the World Quality Report

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People continually say that testing and having good quality test data and test environment is crucial for the success of a product, yet each year the report finds that people haven’t invested in it. This year, for the first time, we are seeing the change that supports investment into testing as a whole, as the idea is taking a stronghold in the mind of the key stakeholders and budget holders. Let’s start from the beginning.

WQR 2019 Focus

This year’s WQR focuses on the significance of testing.

A successful product is a result of elaborate testing; testing that can help build a reliable product, save customer’s money, and help build and sustain businesses even in the dwindling economy. Today, the technology is changing and the need to extensively test a product while maintaining quality test data and environment is paramount.

Current Situation of Testing

Businesses have come to realize the significance of testing and there has been a mindset change.

Businesses today are searching for ways and opting for better options to test their products. However, with emerging technologies such as cloud, the businesses are confused as to what to choose. With the abundance of testing service platforms, Cloud looks alluring. However, before opting for the cloud, it is necessary to gauge if it is a fit.

While opting for new technologies, many lose sight of the requirement, thus losing control over testing their product effectively. The scenario can be very much compared to a sports car, where everyone admires it, but not everyone needs and can benefit from it.

It’s a dilemma.

Challenges

Technologies such as Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, and development methodologies such as Agile, entail fast pace releases, constantly changing requirements and multiple operating environments.

With the Internet of Things (IoT), Cyber and Social media and Analytics, the data is pouring in exponentially leading to challenges in:

The access and the skill required to these operate technologies is also a challenge. The resources are yet to upskill and may take another few years to acquire the fluency required today. The technology, while not new, is still evolving and not accessible to everyone to use. Which in retrospection, might help explain the skill scarcity.

Change in Testing

With temporary test environments now available, we are seeing a gradual change in the testing scenario. WQR survey respondents said that they perform performance testing (63%), functional testing (61%), security testing (58%) on the cloud-based temporary test environment platform. The traditional and permanent test environments are still used, and while the ratio of temporary against permanent test environment is difficult to figure, it does conclude that irrespective of the platform used, people are realizing the significance of testing more than ever.

Future of Testing

With new methodologies such as Agile, testing has surely gotten challenging, however, if we could focus on baking testing within the development lifecycle without worrying about what technology we will use for testing, it will surely help us develop a better product for the customers.

Eventually, the customer would want to have a working product, and that’s the goal.

To conclude

AI is disrupting sectors and we now have faster and good quality data than ever before. The focus now should be on maintaining this data and environment. Eventually, it’s all about the product. Have a clear direction of what is to be tested, how it is to be tested and do we have appropriate test data and environment for it.

If you know what to test and have the perfect environment, the approach: traditional or manual, will just be a process.