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E-ffective Testing for E-commerce

By Angelina Samaroo, Steve Allott and Brian Hambling, ImagoQA, UK

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Introduction

What is e-commerce? For the purposes of this paper, e-commerce (also known as e-business) is defined as the software and business processes required to allow businessesto operate solel or primaril usin! di!ital data flows. "-commerce is often associatedwith web technolo! and is commonl transacted #ia web portals, but e-commerce is

much more than the pro#ision of a web pa!e as the customer interface. $he creation ofinte!rated business processes ("nterprise %esource &lannin!), the inte!ration ofcollections of disparate software applications, each desi!ned to facilitate a differentaspect of the business ("nterprise 'pplication nte!ration), the etension of software andbusiness processes to embrace transactions with suppliers* sstems (+uppl hainana!ement), the need for increased securit for transactions o#er public networks, andthe potential #olume demand at e-commerce sites all pro#ide new and unique challen!esto the e-commerce de#elopment communit challen!es which will require no#el andinno#ator solutions and which will need thorou!h testin! before the are allowed to !oli#e.

Wh is testin! important in the e-commerce en#ironment? $he first and primar reasonis because e-commerce is, b its #er nature, business critical. n the third quarter of1//0, ell*s e-commerce site eceeded 13 million in dail sales4 the "5$rade sitecurrentl eceeds 62, 333 transactions per da, !i#in! a cost of one-da failure of around033,3334 and the tra#el industr in "urope will be worth 2 billion b 2332, accordin!to atamonitor. $he immediac of the customer, with its implied promise of rapiddeli#er at competiti#e prices, and the sheer accessibilit of the web, all combine tocreate potentiall massi#e demand on web sites and portals.

$he second reason is that e-commerce is a massi#e and !rowin! market place but onewhich requires lar!e up-front in#estment to enter successfull. $here are alread 6.0

million web sites worldwide, 2.6 million of which ha#e been created this ear (1///).$he nternational ata orporation () estimates that the e-commerce market will!row from o#er 6billion in 1//0 to 1trillion in 2337. $he a#era!e cost of de#elopmentof an e-commerce site is 1 million, sas the 8artner 8roup, and will increase b 269annuall o#er the net 2 ears.

$he third reason is because the histor of e-commerce de#elopment has been littered withepensi#e failures, at least some of which could ha#e been a#oided b better testin!

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before the site was opened to the !eneral public. (n e-commerce terms, :the site* meansthe entire architecture from suppliers throu!h back-end sstems and front-end sstems tothe customers4 it tpicall includes ntranet, nternet and etranet applications as well asle!ac sstems and third part middleware).

The Testing Challenges

Business Issues

' successful e-commerce application is;

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that the site continues to function acceptabl after chan!es to browsers, search en!inesand portals. >ew issues ha#e also come to the fore for testers, notabl securit oftransactions and the performance of web sites under hea# load conditions.

f we consider an e-commerce site as made up of a front end (the human-computer

interface), a back end (the software applications underlin! the ke business processes)and some middleware (the inte!ratin! software to link all the rele#ant softwareapplications), we can consider each component in isolation.

Front End Systems

Static Testing. $he front end of an e-commerce site is usuall a web site that needstestin! in its own ri!ht. $he site must be sntacticall correct, which is a fairlstrai!htforward issue, but it must also offer an acceptable le#el of ser#ice on one or moreplatforms, and ha#e portabilit between chosen platforms. t should be tested a!ainst a#ariet of browsers, to ensure that ima!es seen across browsers are of the same qualit.

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!iddle"are and Integration

nte!ration is the ke to e-commerce.n order to build an e-commerce application, one ormore of the followin! components are usuall inte!rated;

atabase +er#er

+er#er-side application scripts@pro!rams

'pplication ser#er

=$A forms for user interface

'pplication scripts on the client

&ament ser#er

+cripts@pro!rams to inte!rate with le!ac back-end sstems

$he process of de#elopin! an e-commerce site is si!nificantl different from de#elopin!a web site commerce adds etra le#els of compleit. Bne hi!hl comple feature is

that of inte!ration.

f an application is bein! built that uses a database ser#er, web ser#er and pament ser#erfrom different #endors, there is considerable effort in#ol#ed in networkin! thesecomponents, understandin! connecti#it-related issues and inte!ratin! them into a sin!lede#elopment (eecutable) en#ironment. f le!ac code is in#ol#ed, this adds a newdimension to the problem, since time will need to be in#ested in understandin! theinterfaces to the le!ac code, and the likel impact of an chan!es.

t is also crucial to keep in mind the steep learnin! cur#e associated with cuttin!-ed!etechnolo!ies. Ceepin! pace with the latest #ersions of the de#elopment tools and

products to be inte!rated, their compatibilit with the pre#ious #ersions, and in#esti!atin!all the new features for buildin! optimal solutions for performance can be a dauntin!task. 'lso, since e-commerce applications on the web are a relati#el new phenomenon,there are unlikel to be an metrics on similar proDects to help with proDect plannin! andde#elopment.

$he maintenance tasks of installin! and up!radin! applications can also become #erin#ol#ed, since the demand epertise in;

atabase administration.

Web ser#er administration.

&ament ser#er administration.

'dministration of an other special tools that ha#e been inte!rated into the site.

$echnical support should also be borne in mind.

orrectl functionin! back-end and front-end sstems offer no !uarantees of reliableo#erall functionalit or performance. "nd-to-end testin! of complete inte!ratedarchitectures, usin! realistic transactions, is an essential component.

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Ten Key Principles of Effective E-Commerce Testing

B#er the decades since nformation $echnolo! ($) became a maDor factor in businesslife, problems and challen!es such as those now faced b the e-commerce communit

ha#e been met and sol#ed. Ce testin! principles ha#e emer!ed and these can besuccessfull applied to the e-commerce situation.

Principle 1. Testing is a risk management process. $he most important lesson weha#e learned about software testin! is that it is one of the best mechanisms we ha#e formana!in! the risk to businesses of unsuccessful $ applications. "ffecti#e testin! adoptsa strate! that is tailored to the tpe of application or ser#ice bein! tested, the business#alue of the application or ser#ice, and the risks that would accompan its failure. $hedetailed plannin! of the testin! and the desi!n of the tests can then be conformed b thestrate! into a business-focused acti#it that adds real business #alue and pro#ides someobDecti#e assessment of risk at each sta!e of the de#elopment process. &lans should

include measures of risk and #alue and incorporate testin! and other qualit-relatedacti#ities that ensure de#elopment is properl focused on achie#in! maimum #alue withminimum risk. %eal proDects ma not achie#e e#erthin! that is planned, but the metricswill at least enable us to decide whether it would be wise to release an application for li#euse.

Principle 2. Kno the value of the applications !eing tested. $o mana!e riskeffecti#el, we must know the business #alue of success as well as the cost of failure.$he business communit must be in#ol#ed in settin! #alues on which the risk assessmentcan be based and committed to deli#erin! an a!reed le#el of qualit.

Principle ". #et clear testing o!$ectives and criteria for successful completion%including test coverage measures&. When testin! an e-commerce site, it would be #ereas for the testin! to de!enerate into surfin!, due to the ease of searchin! related sites oranother totall unrelated site. $his is wh the test pro!ramme must be properl planned,with test scripts !i#in! precise instructions and epected results. $here will also need tobe some cross-referencin! back to the requirements and obDecti#es, so that someassessment can be made of how man of the requirements ha#e been tested at an !i#entime. riteria for successful completion are based on deli#erin! enou!h business #alue,testin! enou!h of the requirements to be confident of the most important beha#iour of thesite, and minimisin! the risk of a si!nificant failure. $hese criteria which should bea!reed with the business communit - !i#e us the critical e#idence that we need in

decidin! readiness to make the site accessible to customers.

Principle '. Create an effective test environment. t would be #er epensi#e tocreate a completel representati#e test en#ironment for e-commerce, !i#en the #ariet ofplatforms and the use of the nternet as a communications medium. ross-platformtestin! is, naturall, an important part of testin! an multi-platform software application.n the case of e-commerce, the term :cross-platform* must also etend to include :cross-browser*. n order to ensure that a site loads and functions properl from all supported

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platforms, as much stress and load testin! as possible should be performed. 's anabsolute minimum, se#eral people should be able to lo! into the site and access itconcurrentl, from a miture of the browsers and platforms supported. $he !oal of stressand load testin!, howe#er, is to subDect the site to representati#e usa!e le#els. t would,therefore, be beneficial to use automated tools, such as +e!ue*s +ilk&erformer or ercur

nteracti#e*s Aoad%unner, for performance@load testin!.

Principle (. Test as early as possi!le in the development cycle. t is alread wellunderstood and accepted in the software en!ineerin! communit that the earlier faults aredetected, the cheaper the cost of rectification. n the case of an e-commerce site, a faultfound after shippin! will ha#e been detected as a failure of the site b the marketplace,which is potentiall as lar!e as the number of nternet users. $his has the addedcomplication of loss of interest and possibl the loss of customer loalt, as well as theimmediate cost of fiin! the fault. $he fact that e-commerce de#elopment is rapid andoften based on chan!in! requirements makes earl testin! difficult, but testin! strate!iesha#e been de#eloped b the %' communit, and these can be mobilised for support.

&erhaps the most important idea in %' is the Doint de#elopment team, allowin! users tointeract with the de#elopers and #alidate product beha#iour continuousl from thebe!innin! of the de#elopment process. %' utilises product prototpes, de#eloped in aseries of strictl controlled :timeboes* fied periods of time durin! which theprototpe can be de#eloped and tested to ensure that product de#elopment does not driftfrom its ori!inal obDecti#es. $his stle of web de#elopment makes testin! an inte!ral partof the de#elopment process and enhances risk mana!ement throu!hout the de#elopmentccle.

Principle ). *ser +cceptance Testing %*+T&. $he client or ultimate owner of the e-commerce site should perform field testin! and acceptance testin!, with in#ol#ementfrom the pro#ider where needed, at the end of the de#elopment process. "#en if %' isused with its continuous user testin! approach, there are some attributes of an e-commerce site that will not be eas (or e#en possible, in some cases) to #alidate in thiswa. +ome form of final testin! that can address issues such as performance and securitneeds to be included as a final confirmation that the site will perform well with tpicaluser interactions. Where %' is not used, the scope of the pro#ider*s internal testin!co#era!e and user acceptance testin! co#era!e should be defined earl in the proDectde#elopment lifeccle (in the $est &lan) and re#isited as the proDect nears completion, toassure continued ali!nment of !oals and responsibilities.

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need re!ular re!ression testin!, e#en if their functionalit does not chan!e, because theen#ironment is chan!in! continuousl. Where#er possible, re!ression testin! should beautomated, in order to minimise the impact on the test schedule.

Principle . +utomate as much as possi!le. $his is a risk principle because test

automation is frau!ht with difficulties. t has been said that a fool with a tool is still afool, and that the outcome of automatin! an unstable process is faster chaos, and both ofthese are true. >e#ertheless, the chances of !ettin! adequate testin! done in the ti!httime scales for an e-commerce proDect and without automation are etremel slim. $heke is to take testin! processes sufficientl seriousl that ou document them and controlthem so that automation becomes a feasible option then ou select, purchase and installthe tools. t will not be quick or cheap but it mi!ht Dust a#oid a #er epensi#e failure.

Principle /. Capture test incidents and use them to manage risk at release time. 'test incident is an discrepanc between the epected and actual results of a test. Bnlsome test incidents will relate to actual faults4 some will be caused b incorrect test

scripts, misunderstandin!s or deliberate chan!es to sstem functionalit. 'll incidentsfound must be recorded #ia an incident mana!ement sstem (+), which can then beused to ascertain what faults are outstandin! in the sstem and what the risks of releasemi!ht be. Butstandin! incidents can be one of the completion criteria that we appl, sothe abilit to track and e#aluate the importance of incidents is crucial to the mana!ementof testin!.

Principle 10. anage change properly to avoid undoing all the testing effort.$hin!s chan!e quickl and often in an e-commerce de#elopment and mana!ement ofchan!e can be a bottleneck, but there is little point in testin! one #ersion of a softwareapplication and then shippin! a different #ersion4 not onl is the testin! effort wasted, butthe risk is not reduced either. onfi!uration ana!ement tools, such as &G+ andlearase, can help to minimise the o#erheads of chan!e mana!ement, but the disciplineis the most important thin!.

Conclusions

"-commerce is both familiar and no#el. +ome of the technolo! is relati#el no#el, andthe application of that technolo! to a complete business is certainl no#el, but theproblems of creatin! business processes to operate a business in a wholl newen#ironment o#ershadow all of that no#elt with some familiar and intractable problems.&aradoicall, it is in the more familiar areas of the technolo! that the most seriousproblems arise, because the emer!ence of e-commerce has placed new and challen!in!requirements on this relati#el old technolo! that was desi!ned for a quite differentpurpose.

$estin! is crucial to e-commerce because e-commerce sites are both business critical andhi!hl #isible to their users4 an failure can be immediatel epensi#e in terms of lostre#enue and e#en more epensi#e in the lon!er term if disaffected users seek alternati#esites. Het the time pressures in the e-commerce world militate a!ainst the thorou!h

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testin! usuall associated with business criticalit, so a new approach is needed to enabletestin! to be inte!rated into the de#elopment process and to ensure that testin! does notpresent a si!nificant time burden.

$he #er familiarit of much of the technolo! means that tried and true mechanisms will

either be suitable or can be modified to fit. %apid 'pplications e#elopment (%'), inparticular, su!!ests some promisin! approaches. Aike most new #entures, thou!h, e-commerce must find its own wa and establish its own methods. n this paper we ha#esu!!ested some testin! principles that ha#e stood the test of time and intermin!led themwith some lessons learned from similarl challen!in! de#elopment en#ironments to !i#ee-commerce testers a starin! point for their Dourne of disco#er.

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