There are several reasons why the automation of software testing has grown in recent years. Reduction of costs related to proprietary software and the maturity of Open Source solutions, the use of Cloud Computing to customize the infrastructure required to perform the tests and the increase of qualified professionals to write and execute the test scripts. The death of manual tests was thus decreed.
It starts the race for automation of the tests
Of course, decreeing the death of manual tests is an exaggeration, but as demand for automation grows, many professionals have begun to race against time to be able to develop test scripts, as the professional market began to pay the weight of testers gold with the automation profile.
For many companies, manual testing has lost its priority because automation is related with cost-reducing for the need for manual and runtime testers since after the scripts are created, the testing tools are responsible for running and testing and publish the results.
In this way, there was a strong migration of the manual test teams to the automated tests, a market with high demand was waiting for these new professionals. However, this migration has also become a major concern for many testers, the search for the test area occurs by the identification of the profile and many who entered the area of quality had no affinity with code development. And so, for some testers, automation meant leaving the test area.
But the manual tests still hold great importance in the process of quality and we will see during the article that there is the place for everyone and what is missing is a professional adaptation and the search for the right opportunity.
Automation is still complex activity
Much has been advanced about the automation of testing, but there is still a complexity regarding the development and implementation of test scripts. An example of this difficulty is in the tests applied to mobile solutions.
There is a problem related to automation tools and test scenarios that need to be developed. Tests applied to the mobile platform go beyond verifying application functionalities, but the integration between the native resources of the devices and the application developed, there is the relationship with different types of network connection, the customized versions of the operating systems according to the operators and the different types and brands of mobile devices.
But not only does the complexity of test automation make manual testing still necessary for software projects, we have other good reasons to include this strategy in test projects.
Manual Testing for New Technologies
New technologies and software architectures are emerging constantly or consolidating in the market, for example, Internet of Things, Smart Cities, autonomous vehicles, smartwatches, Chatbots, virtual reality and among others. And the human interaction with these innovations is very strong.
Projects that have emerged in the last few years are usually linked to new concepts and different forms of use by users, and the test automation architecture is not yet ready to support testing projects associated with the development phase. Therefore, the manual tests will be essential to guarantee the quality of the product and to verify the impact with the users: the form of use, response time, the usability, the ease of use, finally the satisfaction of the final clients.
The best of both worlds
Usability has become a very important criterion in software validation, many applications have a lot of resources, are developed with revolutionary proposals, but often do not reach their objectives because they did not consider the behaviour of the end user. The perception gained through manual testing helps to find the ideal point between innovation and user satisfaction.
Many companies are realizing that you need to invest in both automatic and manual testing, especially with the use of agile methodologies while running a project. It is also necessary to dedicate in sprints planning the writing and execution of manual tests.
In the end, the ideal world in an effective testing strategy is to bring together the best of both worlds. To have professionals with the automation profile, with knowledge in programming language and tools and as well as testers with a profile suitable for the exploratory tests, usability and other strategies used for the manual tests. Everybody has to win, especially the customers, future end users of the solutions.
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