SAP Implementation Testing

8/12/2019 SAP Implementation Testing

1/12


2/12

Automated testing for SAP applications with IBM Rational

Functional Tester

About this paper

This technical solution brief describes how Astra Infotech successfully

implemented IBM Rational Functional Tester for automated testing in a

customers SAP application en!ironment" It will show how IBM testing tools

can be used in combination with change and defect trac#ing to ensure $uality

in any customi%ed SAP application landscape"

The Rational Functional Tester solution is used by system integrators who

configure and customi%e SAP systems to meet the specific re$uirements ofindi!idual business customers and end users" Asa business processe!ol!es& the SAP implementation is #eptupdated with ongoing changes"

'ompanies use SAP applications to automate critical businessprocesses" 'omprehensi!e testing is essential to ensure that theseprocesses are carried out correctly in all circumstances" Performing suchtesting manually is time(consuming and strenuous& and is sometimess#ipped or only partially completed" Automation of the testing process helpsto significantly reduce the time re$uired to perform testing consistently fore!ery release"

IBM Rational Functional Tester )"* with the SAP plug(in is a functional testing tool that helps toautomate all the functional tests

re$uired in a SAP implementation" Rational Functional Tester is able to recogni%e the +,I controSAP -et.ea!er Portal& SAP

-et.ea!er Mobile and bac#(end SAP applications ( so its test scripts are reliable and resilient e!when there are changes in the

properties or these +,I controls" Powerful& user(menury data(un!ei i testing and !erification ifi//ti//capabilitis0es and&u aa featauurehat shaa& t enablespattern(matching during playbac# help in the easy de!elopment of reusable test assets" Rational tools can be used with any

SAP landscape based on SAP -et.ea!er Portal technology or SAP +,12"3* or newer"

'ustomer 4b5ecti!es6 Reduce testing wor#load

and cycle time to fit the

needs of a fortnightly

release schedule

6 Impro!e consistency andcomprehensi!eness of test

co!erage

IBM Solution

6 .or# with Astra Infotech tocon!ert manual testing

documentation and processes

into automated scripts 6 7eployIBM Rational 'lear8uest topro!ide change

management and defecttrac#ing& while simplifying

collaboration for thede!elopment and testing teams

6 9e!erage IBM Rational

Functional Tester to automaand accelerate the testing

process


3/12

omer Benefits

esting cycle time has been

uced from three days to

st two hours per fortnight

e solution runs all testsmatically& with no need foranual inter!ention ( so theelopment team cancus on other priorities

e cost ofautomated testing

crementally reducedth each cycle ( assuring return

n!estment after aertain number of cycles

e introduction of a testingewor# with reusable

omponents will ma#e it $uic#ercheaper to create

ew test scripts in future


4/12

Bac#ground& starting point andob5ecti!es

Astra Infotech Pri!ate 9imited is asoftware engineering company

and an Ad!anced IBM Business

Partner in India and :urope" The

company is a leader and e!angelist

for leading(edge software

engineering practices& and offers thefollowing ser!ices;

6 Software engineering consulting

6 Software testing6 Software engineering training6 Software engineering tools

Astra Infotech has a small but highlys#illed team" The companyhas been acti!e in the industry formore than 1< years& and the

team has collecti!e e=perience ofmore than 1** years& spanninga !ariety of applications& organi%ationsand !erticals >see Fig" 1?"

Astra Infotech needed to pro!ide atest automation solution for acustomer who is a SAP Partner and

systems integrator&speciali%ing in implementing solutions

using SAP -et.ea!erMobile" The customer was loo#ing to

automate integrated testingof customi%ed mobile SAP

implementations in!ol!ing SAP

-et.ea!er Portal& SAP -et wea!er

Mobile& and bac#(end SAP

applications" The ma5or re$uirement

was to reduce the cycle timefor regression testing"

Astra Infotech was in!ol!ed in toolidentification& test automation

planning& script recording& andsupport scripting"

)@

Figure 1; 7omain e=perienceofAstra Infotech


5/12

pro5ect

customers typical release

edule in!ol!ed at least a

e(day manual test cycle& andases were generally made

fortnightly basis" The customerected that automation

ld reduce the cycle time to 5ust ahours of unattended

ng& significantly reducing wor#loadturnaround time for

h release and ensuring that testing

ld be performed

sistently during e!ery release"omated testing would also

ure that the co!erage was

sistent& which was another

or challenge with the e=istingng process"

customer already had anblished $uality assurance $ualityrol process& with test cases

umented in Microsoft .ord" Thed documents specified the actionse performed& the conte=t of theseons& and the re$uired

cations"

we!er& since the customer was notfamiliar with automated testing

s& these test cases had to be

pted for automation and coded as

scripts"

ability to pro!ide a complete and

grated solution for testing and

nge and defect management was

of the ma5or reasons for choosing

BM solution" The fle=ibility in the

pting language also supported the

sion significantly" Since theomer is new to test automation& theite support from the Astra Infotechinfluenced the decision"

D Ban#ing& Financial Ser!ices andInsurance

D Tra!el and 9ogistics

7efence and RE7

Cealthcare

ers


6/12

Fle=ible script customi%ationpro!ided

by IBM Rational Functional

Tester helped us deli!er apowerful test automation

solution"F

7r" Si!a#umar'T4

Astra Infotech P!t 9td

4!er!iew of applied technologies

The solution in!ol!ed IBM Rational

'lear8uest for test and

defect management& and IBM

Rational Functional Tester for testautomation"

Rational 'lear8uestIBM Rational 'lear8uest offers

comprehensi!e software change

management" It pro!ides defecttrac#ing& process automation&reporting and lifecycle traceability for

better !isibility and control of thesoftware de!elopment lifecycle"'lear8uests automated wor#flows

and e(mail notifications enhanceteamcommunication and coordination"Test management unifiesde!elopment and testing acti!ities&from planning to results& forimpro!ed software $uality"

Rational Functional Tester

IBM Rational Functional Tester is

an ad!anced automated

functional and regression testingtool fortesters and +,I

de!elopers who need superior

control for testing Ga!a&

Microsoft Hisual Si and .eb(based applicat

Rational Functional Tester records

user interactions with Ga!a&

.eb& and Hisual Studio"-:T

.inForm(based applications&

creating atest script that& when

e=ecuted& reproduces those

actions" 7uring recording& the usercan insert !erification pointsthat e=tract specified data orproperties from the application thatis being tested" 7uring playbac#&these !erification points are

used to compare recorded

information with li!e information to

ensure consistency"

Following any test recording acti!ity&

testers ha!e the option of

adding custom code to the test script

to perform art unlimitedarray of tas#s& including the data

manipulation and en!ironment

configuration acti!ities that areoften necessary to ensure the testlab is properly constituted for thetest run"

After the e=ecution of a test run&

Rational Functional Tester generates

a report listing the results of the!erification point comparisons" .ithRational Functional Tester& teams

are able to e=pose problems morereliably and efficiently in e!en themost comple= applications& ma#ing iteasier to capture and repair defectsbefore the product is released"


7/12


8/12

L

7etailed description of solutionimplementation

Astra Infotech adopted a business(dri!en& iterati!e approach tothe software test automationpro5ect& balancing sta#eholderconcerns and priorities with shortfeedbac# cycles andcontinuous ris# mitigation" This

approach is similar to the iterati!e

approach recommended by the IBMRational ,nified Process

>R,P?& a customi%able and scalable

process framewor# >see

Fig" 3?

The Initiation phase in!ol!ed gainingan initial understanding of the pro5ectand planning the o!erall wor#"

The ma5or phases of the pro5ectwere Inception& :laboration&'onstruction and Transition" :ach ofthese phases in!ol!ed oneor more iterations& with ane=ecutable release at the end ofeach

iteration"

The Inception and :laborationiterations comprised planning

and design acti!ities" In these

phases& the scope of testing& the

test plan and the identification oftest cases and data were

determined" The highest(ris# testcases were implementedprogressi!ely"

The 'onstruction and Transitioniterations comprised the reali%ationacti!ities" In these phases& the

remaining test cases wereimplemented"

The Final Assessment phase then

assessed how effecti!ely the wor#had been done"

Inception

:laboration

I //G

:ase of use& e=cellent technical support

from IBM and& of course& high

affordability made the solution a

real win for Astra Infotech"

Hipin umarM7 E Software :ngineering :!angelist

Astra Infotech P!t 9td

Inception and :laboration phases

Astra Infotech and the customerwor#ed together to identify amedium(si%ed pro5ect to assess the

effecti!eness of IBMRational Functional Tester" IBM

Rational 'lear8uest wasinstalled for test management andIBM Rational FunctionalTester for scripting"

The pro5ect was intended to confirmthe effecti!eness andresilience of scripting using IBM

Rational Functional Tester by

performing integrated testing withatypical scenario for SAP

-et.ea!er Portal& SAP -et.ea!erMobile and bac#(end SAPapplications" Test piai s& test cases

and test suites were created

in IBM Rational 'lear8uest& and

integrated with scripts in IBM

Rational Functional Tester"

This pro5ect confirmed theeffecti!eness of the proposed

approach& so the customer and

Astra Infotech decided to

proceed to the ne=t phases"

'onstruction (" Transition

Pro5ectInitiation

A phase represents a mmilestone and transitio


9/12

rom one p ase o ano er s accompan e w a re! ew FinalAssessmen

Figure 3; Astra Infotechs iterati!e approach


10/12

'onstruction and Transition phases

Test cases were analy%ed for testautomation& and scripts were

recorded& The #ey issuesobser!ed were;

6 Most of the scripts needed to

wor# with the same screen and

the same set of +,I controls"Time was sa!ed by using

shared ob5ect maps for all ofthese scripts6 Modular scripts were used

to handle !ariations in

na!igational se$uences

6 -a!igational se$uences were

isolated as user action scripts6 The built(in data pool capability

was used to parameteri%e

test data6 Application(specific e=ception

handling was established by

abstracting similar e=ception

handling capabilities into

helper superscripts6 Some of the data to be !erified

was embedded as tabular

data in an CTM9 table" Specialpurpose data parsing code

was written to e=tract the

re$uired data6 'ommon portions of scripting

code were pulled into modular&

reusable libraries6 ,sage scenarios were

implemented using test suites

andshot scripts

6 IBM Rational 'lear8uest wasconfigured with a special(

purpose defect submission

form and email notification

The o!erall structure of the testartifacts is as shown in Fig" "

Final Assessment

9essons learned

At the start of the pro5ect& it was

obser!ed that +,I controls wereidentified by number rather thanname" These identification numberswere dynamically generated& and

changed in e!ery build" This affected

the resilience of the test scripts" To

a!oid these issues in future& theapplication was modified to gi!ee=plicit names to the +,I controls"

Benefits

The solution too# three months to

implement& during which time

the customer issued three releasesof the application" Thismeant that the scripts were testedwith all three releases& whichhelped in assessing their resilience"

:=cept in cases where there

were drastic changes >for e=ample& if a

whole new set of +,I

controls was added?& the resilience ofthe scripts was found to bemore than ade$uate"

Rational Functional Tester enabled

the company to reduce itsthree(day manual testing cycle to 5ust

two hours of unattendedautomated testing for each new

customi%ation release of its SAPapplication(based solution" Thereduction in cycle time and

wor#load helps the team spendmore time on de!eloping newfeatures and less on testing (so

new functionalities can be

mplemented and released more

$uic#ly"

'orresponding to scenarios to be tested

Scripts organi%ed module(wise in pac#agesfolders


11/12


12/12

The customer is now planning touse the same approach and

solution across the wholeorgani%ation" Astra Infotech is

supporting the customer by helping

to define atesting framewor# with

re(usable components that can be

used across all pro5ects" The

framewor# will drastically reduce the

upfront in!estment for script

generation for !arious pro5ects"

.ith manual testing& the wor#load

increases with each test cycle"

By contrast& in the automated testing

en!ironment pro!ided by

Rational 'lear8uest and RationalFunctional Tester& once the

initial in!estment of time and effort

has been made& wor#load isreduced with each cycle until a

baseline is reached" As a result&after a certain number of cycles&

return on in!estment is assured

>see Fig" 0?"

1**

an

)*

J*

2*

SAP Implementation Testing

Documents

Transcript of SAP Implementation Testing