Though there is much more to performance engineering than just testing, engineering right needs significant focus on the performance testing aspect of the quality assurance process. Be it test metrics or yielding performance-oriented design, creating a perfect journey towards performance engineering requires effective performance testing.
Since performance engineering is not an easy task to pursue, working on proven performance testing practices could unravel great tech potential. Also, performance testing is a part of performance engineering culture and therefore requires extensive focus to deliver fast and efficient systems. Thus, performance engineering and performance testing are both integral to each other as they play a very significant role in pleasing customers and driving revenue.
Most of the time, people who are associated with quality assurance services often struggle to move from performance testing to performance engineering or integrate performance testing into their performance engineering initiatives.
But since moving from performance testing to performance engineering is quite a complicated process, most of the time organizations pursuing their QA goals struggle to align these together. More importantly, the organizations that have a strong belief in performance engineering are often found struggling with the query that if performance engineering has the potential to replace performance testing?
In this blog, we will aim at understanding the essential factors that performance engineers need to master and skip off in order to replace performance engineering. Also, we will even underline the importance of performance testing solutions and why it needs to be planned and aligned with performance engineering.
Let’s begin!
Unraveling the Importance of Performance Testing
Before we jump on all the reasons that make performance testing a mandate to perform for digital solutions, it is vital to understand what factors QA professionals and performance engineers need to attain in order to take the leap of replacing performance testing.
These include switching from running checkbox performance test scripts and shifting to the study of aligning hardware, software, and configuration for aligning with performance, business value, customer focus, and usability goals. Apart from these, the process involves iterations and collaborations made on the highest-value items in order to yield maximum output for the end-users.
Keeping all these factors in mind, let us quickly jump to all the factors that make performance testing a significant process to pursue:
1. Inconsistent Output
Most mobile experts believe that errors encountered with mobile applications are much greater than what is reported. From network issues to congested servers and poor network conditions, running mobile apps has become even more difficult. Some of the other potential issues that are associated with mobile apps include broken images, black holes in content, checkout errors, timeouts, failed uploads, frozen content, and more.
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2. Disturbed Experience
Another major concern that makes performance testing a mandate for QA testers is poor app experience leading to revenue loss. Be it broken images or slow-loading pages; users are very likely to call off an application.
3. Geographical Concerns
When it comes to mobile apps, websites, or software, the app speed varies from region to region due to changes in network conditions. For instance, creating a global app needs you to cater to audiences that have access to 2G, 3G, or 4G network conditions. If not tested for performance benchmarks related to speed, chances are high that the app could collapse in developing or under-developed nations compared to developed countries.
4. Limited Scalability
Another potential reason that makes testing essential is the unexpected needs related to scalability. For instance, if a system could work well for 100, 1000, or 10,000 users, it becomes necessary to check whether the app should perform equally well for users exceeding 10,000 or when in greater demand.
All in all, performance testing is actually a very significant part of the performance engineering process. In other words, performance testing as a process is vital to performance engineering goals. However, the only thing that restricts organizations focused on performance engineering to get over performance testing is improper implementation causing extensive loss of time and resources.
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Planning Performance Testing
Ever since the world has become familiar with the concepts of Quality Assurance, performance testing has always stayed to be a crucial task to perform. From clients to end users, the need for creating a richer digital experience has pushed performance testing forward as a part of a multi-layered testing approach.
Nevertheless, working on performance testing along with performance engineering goals requires the primary focus on building a solid test strategy. The process needs a focus on chalking out details determining what tests must be performed and prioritized to meet the end goals.
Also, a clear analysis of the user demand and the app components interacting with stress scenarios must be done. Such an approach could help imitate the real-life scenarios associated with an application while allowing to implement the proper testing strategy.
On top of that, performance engineers should work in sync with performance testers to create space for think time in testing. This is the time taken by any average user to scroll through the information displayed on the screen. The process must be fostered to understand how a typical user switches from one section of the app/software to another. The intelligence developed from the process could then be used to plan ahead of purchases.
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And therefore, rather than replacing performance testing, the time issues could be fixed while creating test scripts. To work in such a manner could even streamline maximum and minimum values related to performance.
Most experts associated with QA and performance testing services also believe that the systems must be tested for every component. Such methodology not only helps eliminate the chances of issues but even helps cut the time required for working on performance benchmarks.
All in all, replacing performance testing with performance engineering should rather be worked by involving experienced testers in the test landscape. From baseline tests to implementation, having expertise could help testers yield significant benefits with the product performance goals.
And to sum up, performance testing is actually an important subject in the performance engineering process. From allowing the expertise to flow into driving the performance goals, it is the right management of time, resources, tools, and practices that could help turn performance testing solutions into business productive practices.
