Understanding Business Process Testing

Business Process Testing enables structured testing of an application by combining test automation and automatically generated, easy-to-understand test documentation. Business Process Testing is not dependent on the completion of detailed testing scripts. This enables applications to be tested manually before automated tests are ready. This also enables business process tests to be created and implemented more quickly than other automated tests, enabling potential performance issues to be detected earlier in the development process, before downtime can occur.

Components are easily-maintained, reusable units that perform a specific task. They are the building blocks of business process tests. Each component is comprised of several application steps that are logically performed together in a specific order. For example, in a Web application, a login component might be comprised of four steps. Its first step could be to open the application. Its second step could be to enter a user name. Its third step could be to enter a password, and its last step could be to click the Submit button on the Web page. By creating and calling functions stored in function libraries, you can enhance the component with additional logic to test important details of the login task.

By design, each component tests a specific part of an application. When combined, components are incorporated into a business process test in a serial flow representing the main tasks performed within a particular business process. For example, a business process test for a flight reservation application may include a login component, a flight finder component, a flight reservation component, a purchasing component, and a logout component. The flight finder, flight reservation, and purchasing components might be reused several times within the same business process test to test multiple reservation scenarios. The test might also include a component that resets the application between flight reservations, enabling the test to perform multiple iterations of flight reservations. The task of creating and running components and business process tests is generally performed by Subject Matter Experts working in Quality Center.

Due to the modularity and reusability of components, they can be used in multiple business process tests. For example, the same login and logout components could be used in conjunction with an analysis (report) component that tests the report and graph generation process in the application, or with a frequent flyer component that tests the business process of subscribing to a frequent flyer program.

QuickTest provides two types of components: business components and scripted components. Business components (also known as keyword-driven components) are fully integrated with both QuickTest and Quality Center, enabling both you and Subject Matter Experts to create, modify, and run them. Scripted components are more complex components containing programming logic. Due to their complexity, scripted components can be created and modified only in QuickTest. Subject Matter Experts can view scripted components in Quality Center and incorporate them in business process tests, but they cannot modify them.

Note: Although you can also use QuickTest to create scripted components for use in business process tests, this help focuses on the functionality and features associated with business components. For information on the differences between scripted components and business components, as well as information on working with scripted components.

Before automated testing resources are available, Subject Matter Experts can define manual steps in the Design Steps tab of each component (using the Quality Center Business Components module). They can add these manual components to a business process test and run the steps manually using the Quality Center Manual Runner. As they define components, Subject Matter Experts can add comments in the Discussion Area of the Details tab (in the Quality Center Business Components module). This enables them to enter any additional information or remarks that they want to communicate to you, the Automation Engineer, such as requests for new operations, future changes planned for the component, or alternative tests in which the component can be used.

During this design phase, you can work with the Subject Matter Experts to define which resources and settings are needed for each component. You can then create individual application areas for the various parts of your application based on real testing needs. The application area specifies the settings and resource files used by components when working with business process tests. When a Subject Matter Expert creates a component, the component is always associated with a particular application area, enabling it to access these settings and resource files. After you create the application area and define its settings and resource files, the Subject Matter Expert can incorporate these automated testing resources in business component steps, convert any existing manual components to automated components, and create new automated components.