Why the Need for Database Testing?
Almost every software application, whether web, desktop or cloud, uses some kind of database. Testing these applications and software for streamlined performance and operability while mitigating the back-end database isn’t enough. However, companies within the race of releasing software applications within the market mostly discard the method of testing the database.
You know, the database is that the heart of any application. Moreover, with complex applications, the necessity to possess a stronger and secure database increases. This is why database testing is just as important for testing a software’s performance and functionality.
However, the common practice of testing a knowledge-intensive application involves utilizing a data examining or software testing tool which needs rounds of manual intervention. This limits tons of productivity, which ends up reducing the time-to-market.
Do you need to Automate Database Testing?
Considering the time and efforts needed for testing hundreds and thousands of SQL lines and codes manually and expecting it to be before any deadlines makes no sense. To stay up with the standard and productivity at an equivalent time in today’s agile market, experts suggest implementing automation testing for the database.
Benefits of Database Automation Testing
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Makes the process of testing substantially by creating room to test larger data sets
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Handles complex transactional behaviours
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Allows for more flexible deployment and operational capabilities
Although test automation promises to eliminate all the pains of manual testing, there are certain challenges faced by companies and test engineers in getting the foremost of their database testing.
Most Common Problems Encountered when Performing Automated Database Testing
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Repeatability: Difficulty in getting equivalent results for an equivalent test. Problems in ensuring consistent results – for e.g. false +ve or false -ve.
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Isolation: While testing the database, there are often tons of overheads. Difficulty during a testing database that’s connected to the previously tested database.
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Performance: Slow execution time, takes an extended time to load
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Synchronization with Distributed Systems: Difficulty in synchronizing the database on the cluster.
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Requires database professionals to regulate changes to the database schema and testing: Developers, analysts and managers find them too difficult to figure with database testing.
Apart from the above challenges, incorrect approaches like undergoing formal testing and keeping database testing at the top of the cycle create tons of other challenges. This is often the rationale the standard suffers within the end.
In these situations, it’s essential to possess a typical automation strategy in situ since it ensures database testing is an integral part of the whole testing cycle of an application which within the end contributes to the success of the appliance under test.
How Automation Strategy Helps
Since test automation demands a substantial investment of resources and money, we should always define when to try to do automation, the scope of the automation, and the best tool of automation. Good planning practices can help you reduce high costs. With an automation strategy, one is often certain about achieving the below results:
Data Integrity:
The hope that new data is reflected equally across the board, data integrity is a simple approach that is used to amalgamate newly updated data to the newest state of the data.
Accuracy of Business Rules:
Databases lately aren’t meant only to store records. In fact, they support implementing business logic at the DB level. Automation tools can make sure that the implemented business logic is functioning accurately.
Database Mirroring:
This offers considerable database availability checkups. The principal advantage of those operations is that it checks whether any server instances (e.g. Production, Testing, Staging, etc.) contain identical data.
Automated Database Regression Testing:
Automation tools help in getting the testing team with the database regression testing requirements in no time, overcoming several challenges they face in manual testing. It ensures the functioning of the applications on a daily basis for the changes made within the database tested.
Conclusion
In the above article, we described the approaches to extend data potentials with automated database testing. There might be more benefits of automation testing because the industry is progressing immensely around automation. However, the above-presented points are the foremost key benefits of automation testing in my opinion. Also, in an effort to get 100% results, it’s important to possess the proper automation software testing tool deployed in your testing environment.
