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Manual Testing vs Automated Testing

Difference between Manual testing & Automated Testing

Before we start to know about manual testing and automated testing, let us know some concepts on software testing. Software testing can be defines as task from planning to execution. These software programs help you to easily identify any bugs or errors in the program.

Test plan is first step to software testing

Planning is most appropriate step when you have to start the testing. You need to carry on with manual testing or automated testing easily. Whether you go for any one of the types of testing, you need to follow the following things:

1.      Test planning

1.      Writing test cases

2.      Executing test cases

3.      Reporting results of test cases

Let us know about both the tests in details.

Manual testing: Any test engineers who will manually test the software use this testing technique. A test engineer is responsible for carrying out all test cases and manually executes the application. When he carries all test cases systematically, he can identify whether any particular step has been successful or failed. One basic information that is required while doing manual testing in test cases, how to implement those manually. In this way when the test completed, it gives you an opportunity to easily create and manage manual testing while testing your application. When you add the project item of manual testing a project then it helps you to produce a group of steps that can be performed while testing the application. According to test plan strategy you can write test cases for all kinds of testing. Generally, test engineers write test cases according to design document present in the software. Whenever a testing is performed, the test engineer will usually use the manual testing. It is the beginning stage of testing that is useful for software development.

Advantages of manual testing

1)      It is used in both big and small projects.

2)      The test cases can be added or removed according to the movement of the project.

3)      Within a limited cost budget you can finish this testing.

4)      Manual testing is better than automated testing in terms of reliability.

5)      Tester can execute additional ad-hoc. You will find that more bugs and errors are found with adhoc than the automation.

Disadvantages of manual testing

1)      By using manual testing, you cannot find the size difference of the GUI object and color combination easily.

2)      In this type of testing, the real performance and load cannot be determined for a huge number of clients.

3)      Manual testing is time consuming.

Fig: manual testing

manual-testing-vs-automated-testing

manual-testing-vs-automated-testing

Automated testing: Automated testing is a type of testing where test engineers are responsible for running script on any testing tool for testing. This process of using tools to test software using scripts is not so easy. It requires good programming knowledge by the engineer. This would be helpful for them to write any script for any kind of test case. At this point, they make good plans and scripts for various test cases. Here complete time is devoted to write scripts. There is a set of environment tools to run these test cases, and these are important as any kind of small errors may cause failure in test result. All detailed information is good even GUI objects of screen are the important information while supporting languages and writing tools.

Advantages of automated testing

1)      Within a short period of time, you can cover all the major test cases.

2)      Using tools, you can check all kind of cases like performance and load of the software.

3)      It is the best choice for regression testing.

4)      Sometimes certain websites requires instantaneous assessment, and this testing is the best choice during this time.

5)      This testing can be executed on different operating platforms within same time

6)      This kind of testing is used as easy tools in the case of volume testing.

7)      Within short period, you can obtain test results of many test cases.

Disadvantages of automated testing

1) This test will use a longer time, as it requires test cases to be resolved in to scripts.

2) When you compare it to manual testing, this testing is expensive.

3) Not all tools support all languages, as there is much software for different language testing.

4) This kind of testing is not able to detect color related issues.

5) As it cannot read tags, hence automated testing is not able to recognize any kind of heading tags that is missing.

6) This test cannot identify the descriptive attributes.

7) To find out whether the website is logical or functional in case the browsers are not supporting the scripts and style sheets or even if the user disable these it cannot be identified by automated testing.

8) This testing does not support any video or mp3 file.

Fig: automation testing

manual-testing-vs-automated-testing2

manual-testing-vs-automated-testing2

There are specific situation where you should use either manual testing or automation testing. However, in some situation, you can make use of both the tests. Here are those situations:

1)      Functional: Functionality test is something that must be done manually as well as in automated.

2)      Use cases or user scenarios. Here you can string together functional tests in to overflow and this can create realistic user scenarios whether you use it manually or automatically. If the workflow involves human intervention, then trick is here is that automated testing must be avoided.

3)      User interface: You can test the user interface using automated testing but you have to keep track of costs as changes required frequently may result in high costs.

4)      Date and time handle: If test cases can easily reset computer’s clock then you can automate these tests.

Both of these testing will help you to test application with specific technique. On one side testing manually is based on concepts and functions of project and automated testing is based on tool support for specific languages. Manual testing is preferred for small projects and automated for big projects to save money and time respectively. With so many automation testing tools available in market, you can easily get rid of all errors and bugs in program with easy means. Both of these testing tools have their own respective share of responsibilities in testing projects. With best of tools available in market, you can get ahead of competitors easily.

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One Comment

  1. Your name says:

    I’m not positive where you are getting your info, but great topic. I needs to spend a while studying much more or understanding more. Thanks for wonderful information I used to be searching for this info for my mission.

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