I talk to clients and potential clients daily about our business analysis solution and its capabilities for managing requirements and associated testing and quality assurance activities. We have an excellent tool for performing these activities. However, I see a lot of confusion concerning testing and quality assurance with respect to requirements management tools. In this blog, I will describe the various types of testing tools.
To perform successful testing usually requires a variety of tools. There is no single tool on the market, including ours, that does it all – regardless of what vendors may claim. There are usually many people and groups that participate in testing activities and each group may require a different type of tool, depending of course on what they are trying to do. Below is a list of people that generally participate in testing activities.
- Users
- Developers
- Quality assurance teams
- Business analysts
- DBAs
- Product owners/sponsors
- Compliance and internal audit
- Performance testing engineers
- Penetration and security test consultants
There are many different types of tools available for testing. Testing tools can generally be categorized into following three main classes: Test Management Tools, Test Data Planning and Preparation Tools, and Automated Testing Tools. A description of each tool class is provided below.
Test Management Tools
Test management tools are focused on the overall testing cycle, as well as test management and reporting during complete project cycle. These management tools are further classified based on the purposes of different functionalities they perform or which testing phase they emphasis upon. Test management tools can generally be categorized into three categories:
- Requirements management tools
- Test management tools
- Review tools
- Configuration management tools
- Bug tracking tools
Test Data Planning and Preparation Tools
Test data planning and preparation tools help testing resources prepare test data, analyze risks, and plan test coverage.
- Test data preparation
- Modeling tools
- Coverage management tools
Automated Testing Tools
Automated testing tools helps with actual execution of tests. They can often perform stress testing and simulate systems under load or even automatically playback prerecorded test scripts. Automated testing tools can be further classified into the following categories.
- Test execution tools
- Performance measurement tools
- Unit test tools
- Security vulnerability tools
The table below shows key features and functions for each type of tools and an at least one example for each type of tool.
Test Management Tools | |
Requirements Management Tools |
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Test Management Tools |
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Review Tools |
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Configuration Management Tools |
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Bug Tracking Tools |
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Modeling Tools |
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Automated Testing Tools | |
Test Execution Tools |
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Unit Test Tools |
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Security Vulnerability Tools |
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Performance Measurement Tool |
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Test Data Planning and Preparation Tools | |
Test Data Preparation |
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Coverage Management Tools |
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Static Analysis Tools |
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