When we talk about software testing, a term that pops up the first and the most important part is functional testing. Factually, software testing encompasses two kinds, functional testing, and non-functional testing.
Where functional testing focuses on the core functions or the problems that the code supposedly solves, non-functional testing caters to the external aspects of the software. The load, reliability, the speed, and the performance, together with falls among the scope of non-functional testing. This article, however, is confined to the infrastructure of functional testing, and hence, we would continue our discussion with it.
Why You Should Care About Functional Testing?
Having said that, functional testing deals with the basic functionality of the software; some consider functional testing to be the wastage of time and resources. And yes, it could be if your application has just one or two modules. Unlikely, huge software applications come with dozens of features and a single glitch in the software; the company might end up suffering huge losses.
Remember the iOS 11.1 update. Though you may think that Apple is a huge company and they would never have software issues, reality has a different opinion. Evidently, the update wasn’t tested properly. The resultant being:
- Failure to type the letter ‘I.’
- A cracking sound for every call.
Now, this is purely the drawback of not testing the features properly. It is the job of a functional tester to ensure that all of the mentioned software features run properly and execute expected results.
How to Perform Good Functional Testing?
Functional Testing is basically feeding input in the given application and then mapping the expected outcome with the actual results. For applications where the above two finds a match, the testing team declares the software ready for deployment. In a case, there arrives an error or a bug; the application is sent back to the development team to fix the bug.
As a matter of fact, there are three particular ways to test the overall functionality of a software or a piece of code.
A) Black Box Testing:
This is primarily the one where the testing team does not have much knowledge about the internal components and the architecture of the code. Apparently, the black box testing verifies the end to end functionality of the developed software and is done after the development process.
B) White Box Testing:
Essential; the white box testing is done at the start of the development process and has the job to test the robustness of the code. White box testing encompasses unit tests and is one of the essential phases of functional testing. These tests are done under the influence that the tester has significant knowledge about the code and integral components of the software application.
C) Gray Box Testing:
The average of the above two, gray box testing is done during the development process as it approaches towards the end of integration. Here, the team has partial knowledge of the happenings of the code.
These processes can be accomplished manually or using automated testing practices, or through a process which follows a hybrid approach.
The Different Types:
Now that you are well versed in the concept of functional testing, the need, and how you can adopt the same, let’s move ahead with the different types of functional testing.
- Unit Testing
- Integration Testing
- System Testing
- Sanity Testing
- Regression Testing
- User Acceptance Testing
As the name suggests, unit testing verifies the functionality of the smallest unit of code. By the smallest unit, we mean to say that it is that part of the code which has one or two inputs with a single output. Unit testing is done to ensure that every single component in the software works effectively.
After testing, each and every component of the software, the team fuses two components to test their usability. Integration testing focuses on the integrational aspect of the code and notifies if they occur a bug in the combined modules.
System testing is the testing that encompasses the entire software and tests it as a single unit. Here, the team performs a series of tests to ensure that the developed system is compliant with the stated requirements and performs as expected.
Once the code has been sent to the build process, the same is tested inducing minor changes. The sole purpose of sanity testing is to check whether changes made causes the software to behave abruptly.
This is done to assure that fixing bugs and adding new features does not affect the overall functionality of the developed software.
This is the final kind and the most important one. Here, the developed software is tested for the level of acceptance. Meaning that if the application is launched in the market, would it be accepted by the users and perform as expected. In a nutshell, user acceptance testing determines whether or not the application is market-ready.
Wrapping Up
Functional Testing can either be done manually or through different automated processes and functional testing tools. Now, automating the entire process might not be cost-effective. So, only the processes that embed extensive functionality, and has the likelihood to behave differently in different scenarios, should be opted for automation. The fact that automated tools have a bundle of test cases, using tools such as Selenium, Watir, Ranorex, etc. would help you enhance the testing efficiency. Also, developing usable test cases consume a lot of time and so automation would not only improve performance but also save time, optimizing the entire process. Leverage our comprehensive range of functional testing services to build reliable, robust, and high-quality software applications.
