With an exceptional number of changes happening day in day out, the software testing industry has become one of the most burgeoning industry across the globe. New technologies are overcoming and disrupting the existing ones. As a result, the rapid scale of development is not keeping just the developers but also the testers on tenterhooks. Over the last decade, test engineers/QA have been struggling hard in order to cope with the changes and newly grown paddocks.
The year 2015 has seen a great evolution in the testing space with a plethora of upcoming trends ranging from Service Oriented Architecture to increase in virtualization and adoption of technologies like cloud computing, Agile and DevOps methodologies. Which eventually led to the worldwide acceptance of testing in the software development lifecycle. The following post summarizes top 10 emerging trends/predictions for 2017 & beyond that will definitely reshape the landscape of software testing.
Current Emerging Trends Include:
Mobile application testing (Rapid growth in Mobile testing) - The surge of mobile devices in the market has led to a significant increase in testing activities in regards to functionality, performance, and security.
Cloud-based Testing (Virtualization and Cloud Computing) - Cloud computing has successfully entered the mainstream. As a result, many software development companies are able to visualize a positive growth in the adoption of cloud-based testing.
Testing in the Agile Development Environment- The holistic testing approach with agile development is pretty much in vogue as it focuses more on getting into the delivery phase without having to wait for long.
Context-driven test- One size fits all approach never works when it comes to testing and the following trend is expected to bring more and more skills to the table for any given content or business situation.
Security Testing- With the increase in connectivity of data and information systems, security testing has become the top priority for software testers as well as entrepreneurs.
Crowd sourced testing- This form of testing is helpful in situations where the team may not have all the resources to test the software in the different environment and in different scenarios.
Proliferation of open-source testing tools- Agile methods have spun-off many open-source test tools like X-Unit, Selenium, etc.
Tester Certification- Since the 1980s, The ISTQB program has succeeded in bringing openness and global reach. Moreover, it is part of professionalization.
What’s Upcoming In Software Testing?
The Future Lies In Open Source Tools- The upcoming decade will see a wide range of open source tools in action as more and more organizations will adopt them for proper implementation of Agile, Devops and Test automation. Which means numerous support communities for open source will end up becoming more and more involved and active.
Quality with high speed- It’s all about delivering high-end products in the fastest possible time. With the rise in latest tools and technologies, more and more software development companies are compelled to provide best user experience along with the fastest time to market.
The demand for Software testers is more likely to rise- According to Matthew Heusser, principal consultant of Excelon Development, “Software testers must become more techie.” And this does not stop at having a technical know-how. Companies will expect professionals to play a more assertive role in guiding software quality assurance and development. Unfortunately, those who are unable to adapt the new level of expectations will struggle.
Agile and DevOps- Test automation has now successfully become a crucial part of the agile teams. And with the arena making a shift towards quality engineering, it is more intended to become iterative, progressive, and seamlessly integrated with development.
Digital Transformation- A wide range of organizations have been observed making a foray into the digital world. All it requires is the huge shift of focus towards digital testing, robust strategies for digital assurance on optimizing functional testing across channels.
BigData- Automation’s impact on the software testing field is going to expand. Thus, software programmers are required to have a strong strategy around BigData testing by using analytical tools, techniques, and frameworks.
Internet Of Things (IoT) - IoT growing leaps and bounds, people have started relying on IoT testing before using the product. For example, if the product is not tested they are more likely to be vulnerable to security problems.
Impact Of DevOps- The ideology is based on seamless collaboration between different departments of an IT organization, i.e. software developers, quality professionals, and IT professionals. DevOps is successfully propelling businesses towards the great speed of deployment and quality assurance.
Testing has been replaced by Engineering- “A good user experience makes a product successful.” Organizations have started changing their strategies. And performance engineering is replacing performance testing.
Budgets will continue to grow- With such huge demand for high-quality products and IT trends like BigData analytics, Cloud Technologies, Mobility, and Virtualization, Testing has become more than just a need. As a result, organizations will be compelled to allocate a bigger chunk of the budget for testing and QA testing services purposes.
Conclusion
Whether you blame it on globalization or new emerging technology, new trends have changed the landscape of testing. Businesses around the world awakening to the need to have a well-designed and futuristic quality assurance process just to maintain their edge in the industry.
“Quality is free, but only to those who are willing to pay heavily for it.”— DeMarco and Lister”
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