Solid State Group Uses uTest for Software Testing of Social Networking Site

uTest today announced that Solid State Group, a content management, web applications and services consultancy, is using uTest for a professional social networking website. In addition to the flexibility of uTest's Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform and the ability to meet tight deadlines, Solid State sees the global community of testers(uTesters) as a huge draw.

"Sometimes team members are too close to the project to pick up every single error, which is why it helps to have a fresh set of eyes dedicated to finding bugs and delivering a high-quality application," said Felicity Stone, QA Project Manager, Solid State Group. "uTest's unique platform affords us the opportunity to test across a vast number of platforms and environments and access to a global network of testing professionals that makes our job a lot easier. uTest simply provides us the confidence that we are releasing a thoroughly tested product to our customers."

This is the second release cycle for which Solid State Group has deployed uTest's services. Previously, the company was performing all testing in-house until they decided that a third party review would greatly benefit them and their customers. With uTest driving the testing, Solid State Group is able to allow its staff to focus on other areas of application development.

"The business value Solid State obtains from uTest's services is further validation of the strength of our service, and the fact that they are a repeat customer is highly rewarding," said Doron Reuveni, chief executive officer, uTest. "It's wonderful that they are able to utilize our skilled testing community to obtain the superior quality and results they strive to deliver to their customers."

The uTest model represents an evolution in traditional software application testing. By offering virtual on-demand software testing services and a Pay-for-Performance business model, uTest provides its clientele a tremendous resource, with flexibility regarding platform, environment, geographic location and budget. The uTester Community of 9,000+ highly skilled software professionals across nearly 140 countries, delivers unparalleled real-world testing throughout product development lifecycles.

uTest offers two pricing models, On-Demand and Annual Subscription. Both options reflect the unique Pay-for-Performance and Pay-per-Bug model. For more information please visit www.utest.com or contact the sales office at (800) 445-3914. Additionally, to view a demo of uTest's services, please visit http://www.utest.com/solutions_watch_a_demo.htm.

HCL Launches First of Its Kind On-Demand Software Testing Lab

HCL Technologies Ltd. ("HCL"), India's leading global IT Services Company, today announced the launch of an innovative on-demand software testing lab at Software 2008 that allows Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) to reduce their software testing cycle times and lower their capital expenditure on testing hardware and software.

"Our experience working with more than 100 customers over the last several years has shown us that developing and maintaining in-house testing expertise leads to high capital costs to setup the infrastructure, and high resource costs due to the cyclical demand," says G.H. Rao, Corporate Vice President, R&D Services, and HCL. "To enable our customers to address these challenges, we are making an investment of USD 6 million to setup a first-of-its-kind on-demand software testing lab."

The on-demand software testing lab includes a state-of-the art testing laboratory in India with 300 high-end servers of all popular makes (such as HP, Sun, Dell, IBM) with single/multiple CPUs provisioned with leading software testing tools. Customers can setup, provision, perform and manage testing on the lab -- all from a remote location through a secured communication channel.

The testing lab is complemented by a pool of specialized testing professionals that provides niche testing services such as performance benchmarking and capacity planning, high availability testing, firewall testing and security protocol testing etc. The testing service also includes an in-house developed IP on test automation -- Automation+ -- a testing framework that automates the entire test cycle including test environment setup and configuration, installs related applications and identifies the required automated test suites to be run on the installed software.

The on-demand software testing lab will provide a competitive edge to ISVs by enabling them to improve their products and take them to the market faster. This also helps them address a wider market through certification across various platforms, such as operating systems and browsers, further enhancing the revenue potential.

About HCL Technologies

HCL Technologies is one of India's leading global IT Services companies, providing software-led IT solutions, remote infrastructure management services and BPO. Having made a foray into the global IT landscape in 1999 after its IPO, HCL Technologies focuses on Transformational Outsourcing, working with clients in areas that impact and re-define the core of their business. The company leverages an extensive global offshore infrastructure and its global network of offices in 18 countries to deliver solutions across select verticals including Financial Services, Retail & Consumer, Life Sciences & Healthcare, Hi-Tech & Manufacturing, Telecom and Media & Entertainment (M&E). For the quarter ended 31st March 2008, HCL Technologies, along with its subsidiaries had last twelve months (LTM) revenue of US $ 1.8 billion (Rs. 7083 crores) and employed 49,802 professionals.

About HCL Enterprise

HCL Enterprise is a $4.8 billion (Rs. 19,640 crores) leading Global Technology and IT Enterprise that comprises two companies listed in India - HCL Technologies Ltd. and HCL Info systems Ltd. The 3-decade-old enterprise, founded in 1976, is one of India's original IT garage start-ups. Its range of offerings spans Product Engineering, Custom & Package Applications, BPO, IT Infrastructure Services, IT Hardware, Systems Integration, and distribution of ICT products. The HCL team comprises approximately 55,703 professionals of diverse nationalities, who operate from 18 countries including 360 points of presence in India. HCL has global partnerships with several leading Fortune 1000 firms, including leading IT and Technology firms. For more information, please visit www.hcl.in.

Other product or service names mentioned herein are the trademarks of their respective owners.

For details, contact:
Citigate Cunningham for HCL Technologies
Susan Vander May
415-618-8721
Email Contact

Basics of Silk test

1) What is SilkTest?

Ans. SilkTest is a software testing automation tool developed by Segue Software, Inc.

2) What is the Segue Testing Methodology?

Ans. Segue testing methodology is a six-phase testing process:

1. Plan - Determine the testing strategy and define specific test requirements.

2. Capture - Classify the GUI objects in your application and build a framework for running your tests.

3. Create - Create automated, reusable tests. Use recording and/ or programming to build test scripts written in Segue's 4Test language.

4. Run - Select specific tests and execute them against the AUT.

5. Report - Analyze test results and generate defect reports.

6. Track - Track defects in the AUT and perform regression testing.

3) What is SilkTest Host?

Ans. SilkTest Host is a SilkTest component that manages and executes test scripts. SilkTest Host usually runs on a separate machine different than the machine where AUT (Application Under Test) is running.

4) What is SilkTest Agent?

Ans. SilkTest Agent is a SilkTest component that receives testing commands from the SilkTest Host and interacts with AUT (Application Under Test) directly. SilkTest Agent usually runs on the same machine where AUT is running.

5) What is 4Test?

Ans. 4Test is a test scripting language used by SilkTest to compose test scripts to perform automated tests. 4Test is an object-oriented fourth-generation language. It consists of 3 sets of functionalities:

1. A robust library of object-oriented classes and methods that specify how a testcase can interact with an application’s GUI objects.

2. A set of statements, operators and data types that you use to introduce structure and logic to a recorded testcase.

3. A library of built-in functions for performing common support tasks.

6) What is the DOM browser extension?

Ans. Document Object Model (DOM) browser extension is a SilkTest add-on component for testing Web applications. DOM browser extension communicates directly with the Web browser to recognize, categorize and manipulate objects on a Web page. It does this by working with the actual HTML code, rather than relying on the visual pattern recognition techniques currently employed by the Virtual Object (VO) extension.

7) What is the VO browser extension?

Ans. Virtual Object (VO) browser extension is a SilkTest add-on component for testing Web applications. VO browser extersion uses sophisticated pattern recognition techniques to identify browser-rendered objects. The VO extension sees Web pages as they appear visually; it does not read or recognize HTML tags in the Web application code. Instead, the VO extension sees the objects in a Web page; for example, links, tables, images and compound controls the way that you do, regardless of the technology behind them.

8) Is there any problem in using scripts created on v6.0 to 6.5 or higher versions?

Ans. Moving from lower to higher version should not be a problem.... This is a general statement and cannot be true at all instances. I faced problems with scripts working in 6.5 not running in 7.0 because some of the recognition patterns used each changed. And in some situations, finally landed two paths of the script to perform same action based on version. PS: Did not encounter any problems from 6.0 to 6.5.

9) What is SilkTest project?

Ans. A SilkTest project is a collection of files that contains required information about a test project.

10) How to create a new SilkTest project?

Ans. 1. Run SilkTest.

2. Select Basic Workflow bar.

3. Click Open Project on the Workflow bar.

4. Select New Project.

5. Double click Create Project icon in the New Project dialog box

6. One the Create Project dialog box, enter your project name, and your project description.

7. Click OK.

8. SilkTest will create a new subdirectory under SilkTest project directory, and save all files related to the new project under that subdirectory.

Jonckers Successfully Deploys Borland(R) SilkTest(R) and Automates Software Testing

Jonckers Translation &Engineering, Microsoft Service Vendor of the Year 2007, today announced the successful adoption of Borland(R) SilkTest(R) for automated software testing. Borland SilkTest was evaluated over several months in a pilot functional testing project after being chosen from a competitive selection process.

Jorge Estevez, Group Engineering Manager for Jonckers stated, "The adoption of Borland SilkTest offers our clients the ability to quickly and cost-effectively release dependable products to their global markets. Investing in this technology is critical to the long-term success of
Jonckers and the localization industry at large, Borland's product proved to be far ahead of its competition both during the pilot evaluation and in ongoing customer projects."

Wolfgang Karas, Regional MD at Borland Software, said, "Jonckers is a valued partner and a recognized innovator in the localization industry, and Effective software testing is a vital component of their products
Dependability. The challenge for software delivery teams is to balance cost and time to market with dependable quality. It is our understanding that Jonckers selected SilkTest because it helps them effectively address this Challenge -- which in turn leads to greater customer loyalty."

New automated testing processes have now been rolled out across Jonckers' global testing centers in the Czech Republic, Vietnam and China. Estevez noted, "Being able to scale software testing in this way means we can pass on financial benefits to our customers, strengthening our
commitment to provide the most cost effective solutions possible in our market place."

A white paper on the benefits of Automated Testing is available for download at http://www.jonckers.com.

About Jonckers

Jonckers, MS Service Vendor of the Year 2007, is focused on delivering software, eLearning and multimedia localization services to the world's best companies. Jonckers achieves localization excellence through an ERP controlled global network of wholly owned offices spanning Asia, Europe and the US allowing Jonckers to deliver low cost global resources without
sacrificing quality. Please visit http://www.jonckers.com for more information.

Borland, SilkTest and all other Borland brand and product names are service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of Borland Software Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries.

LoadRunner Vuser Technology

The actions that a Vuser performs during the scenario are described in a Vuser script. When you run a scenario, each Vuser executes a Vuser script. The Vuser scripts include functions that measure and record the performance of the server during the scenario.

To measure the performance of the server, you define transactions. Transactions measure the time that it takes for the server to respond to tasks submitted by Vusers. For instance, you can define a transaction that measures the time it takes for the server to process a request to view the balance of an account and for the information to be displayed at the ATM.

You insert rendezvous points into Vuser scripts to emulate heavy user load on the server. Rendezvous points instruct multiple Vusers to perform tasks at exactly the same time. For example, to emulate peak load on the bank server, you insert a rendezvous point to instruct 100 Vusers to simultaneously deposit cash into their accounts.

You use the LoadRunner Controller to manage and maintain your scenarios. Using the Controller, you control all the Vusers in a scenario from a single workstation.

When you execute a scenario, the LoadRunner Controller distributes each Vuser in the scenario to a host . The host is the machine that executes the Vuser script, enabling the Vuser to emulate the actions of a human user

Vuser Types

LoadRunner has various types of Vusers. Each type is designed to handle different aspects of today's client/server architectures. You can use the Vuser types in any combination in a scenario in order to create a comprehensive client/server test. The following Vuser types are available:

GUI (Windows and UNIX)

1. RTE (Windows and UNIX)
2. Database (CtLib, DbLib, Informix, Oracle, and ODBC)
3. Web
4. TUXEDO
5. APPC
6. Windows Sockets
7. Baan
8. Java
9. DCOM
10. PeopleSoft

What is Client/Server Load Testing?

Modern client/server architectures are complex. While they provide an unprecedented degree of power and flexibility, these systems are difficult to test. Whereas single-user testing focuses primarily on functionality and the user interface of a single application, client/server testing focuses on performance and reliability of an entire client/server system.

For example, a typical client/server testing scenario might depict 200 users that login simultaneously to a system on Monday morning: What is the response time of the system? Does the system crash? To be able to answer these questions-- and more--a complete client/server performance testing solution must

1. Test a system that combines a variety of software applications and hardware platforms
2. Determine the suitability of a server for any given application
3. Test the server before the necessary client software has been developed
4. Emulate an environment where multiple clients interact with a single server application
5. Test a client/server system under the load of tens, hundreds, or even thousands of potential users

Introduction to Load Runner

LoadRunner is an industry-leading performance and load testing product by Hewlett-Packard (since it acquired Mercury Interactive in November 2006) for examining system behavior and performance, while generating actual load. LoadRunner can emulate hundreds or thousands of concurrent users to put the application
Through the rigors of real-life user loads, while collecting information from key infrastructure components (Web servers, database servers etc). The results can then be analyzed in detail, to explore the reasons for particular behavior.

LoadRunner is divided up into 3 smaller applications:

The Virtual User Generator allows us to determine what actions we would like our Vusers, or virtual users, to perform within the application. We create scripts that generate a series of actions, such as logging on, navigating through the application, and exiting the program.

The Controller takes the scripts that we have made and runs them through a schedule that we set up. We tell the Controller how many Vusers to activate, when to activate them, and how to group the Vusers and keep track of them.

The Results and Analysis program gives us all the results of the load test in various forms. It allows us to see summaries of data, as well as the details of the load test for pinpointing problems or bottlenecks.

Consider the client-side application for an automated teller machine (ATM). Although each client is connected to a server, in total there may be hundreds of ATMs open to the public. There may be some peak times — such as 10 a.m. Monday, the start of the work week — during which the load is much higher than normal. In order to test such situations, it is not practical to have a testbed of hundreds of ATMs. So, given an ATM simulator and a computer system with LoadRunner, one can simulate a large number of users accessing the server simultaneously. Once activities have been defined, they are repeatable. After debugging a problem in the application, managers can check whether the problem persists by reproducing the same situation, with the same type of user interaction.