A Complete Guide to Codeless Testing
Software Testing is an integral part of the Software Development Life Cycle. It ensures that the application connects accurately with each of its modules and works seamlessly. Testing is also done to detect and fix the issues early in the lifecycle of the application. This helps in delivering the quality product to end users and benefits the business.
Testing is required in every phase of the application, and doing all the stuff manually consumes a lot of time. So, in order to deliver the quality product to the market it is necessary to automate the tests as it helps in saving the test execution time and get faster feedback on the builds.
Due to the need for programming skills to write test automation scripts, companies often struggle to develop stable, maintainable, and robust automation frameworks. This is largely due to a shortage of skilled personnel and the rapidly changing technology landscape. To address these challenges, codeless testing tools were introduced, allowing testers and developers to create automated test scripts without needing to write code.
The popularity of AI and ML in the industry in recent years and their ability to reduce the test lifecycle has helped software testing companies enhance their ROI.
What is Codeless Testing?
Codeless testing is a modern approach to test automation that allows anyone, including testers and other stakeholders to create test scripts without writing any code. With codeless testing tools, testers simply select the appropriate options within the tool to interact with web elements and perform assertions.
Codeless testing allows creating automated tests using straightforward interfaces and visual workflows, without requiring specialized programming skills. It simplifies the creation and execution of automated tests, making it accessible to a broader audience. This approach improves the testing process while ensuring software quality and user satisfaction.
Benefits of Codeless testing
The primary benefit of Codeless testing is that it allows the testers as well as non-technical team members to contribute to test automation by creating and executing the tests without needing the advanced coding skills. This helps in speeding up the testing process and leads to faster development cycles and building the quality within the product.
The other benefits of codeless testing include:
Early implementation of Test Automation
With a UI available for test creation, testers simply select the appropriate options for their tests. This accelerates the test creation process by eliminating the need to write code and develop coding logic. This enables test automation in the development lifecycle at an early stage.
No Coding Skills required
Codeless testing tools enable manual testers to participate in test automation without prior coding experience. These tools are also user-friendly and straightforward to learn and implement. Any non-technical member in the team can use it seamlessly allowing more hands to contribute towards test automation.
Ease of Use
Thanks to the user-friendly interface and usability approach of codeless testing tools, anyone in the team can easily get hands-on using these tools. Additionally, these tools often include predefined videos and product tours to help testers learn how to use them effectively.
Helps in accelerating Regression Test Cycles
Manual testers often find running regression tests to be tedious. Repeating the same tests manually increases the risk of human errors and could lead to critical bugs slipping through to production. Codeless testing tools allow for the automation and repetition of regression tests, freeing up testers to focus on other important tasks.
What is Low Code, No Code and Codeless testing?
Technologies such as Low Code, No Code, and Codeless testing have become increasingly important in the software development process. These technologies help in simplifying the automation, enhancing the reviewability by allowing the non-technical reviewers to ensure all the required test cases have been included.
What are Low Code Testing tools?
Low Code testing tools enable testers to automate tests without manually writing code, eliminating the need for in-depth knowledge of test automation frameworks. While basic programming skills are helpful, they are not mandatory for using these tools.
With these tools, product managers, business analysts, and other less technically proficient individuals can actively contribute to the testing process and participate in the Software Development LifeCycle (SDLC). Examples of such tools include Tricentis TOSCA, etc.
What are No Code/Codeless testing tools?
Ideally, No Code and Codeless testing refer to the same concept. These tools enable test automation without requiring extensive coding and no prior programming or coding experience is needed for using these tools.
Testers and developers can easily create test automation scripts using the user interface and drag-and-drop features of these tools. Examples of such tools include Testim, Selenium IDE, etc.
The following table showcases the difference between Low Code, No Code and Codeless testing tools
Difference between Low Code, No Code and Codeless testing tools
The following table explains the difference between Low Code, No Code and Codeless testing tools
How does Codeless Testing work?
Codeless Testing tools might use any of the following three approaches eliminating the need to write code for testing
- Record and Playback approach
- Natural Language Processing(NLP)
- Test Flow diagram approach
Record and Playback approach
This approach allows the testers to manually record all the steps of the test scenario they wish to automate. The tool then automatically generates the underlying code for test automation. After recording the test steps, the tester can make necessary adjustments using the tool for test execution.
Once the test is created, it can be replayed multiple times as needed. Examples of tools using the record and playback approach include Testim, Selenium IDE, etc.
Test Flow diagram approach
In this approach, testers create a structured test flow diagram to automate tests. During execution, the test scripts run automatically based on the actions defined in the diagram. “Test flow chart” tool is an example of such a codeless testing tool.
Natural Language Processing(NLP)
In this approach, the test cases are written in plain english sentences. The Natural Language Processing engine then converts these test cases written in plain English to machine understandable format that the codeless testing application understands.
How to Choose Codeless Testing tool?
With the technical advancements and the popularity of AI and ML assisted Codeless testing tools, there are multiple tools available in the market that can help testers perform Codeless testing. However, every team needs the best tool to support their testing.
Testim is the leading AI-powered test automation platform for custom web applications. Testim enables fast authoring of AI-stabilized UI and end-to-end tests.
The following points can help you in choosing the best Codeless testing tool
Cost
This is a crucial factor in deciding whether to proceed with a tool. When considering commercial tools, it’s important to evaluate costs such as licensing, support, and premium features. For open-source tools, ensure that the project is actively maintained and popular. Additionally, check if there are any paid pro features that may be required.
Ease of Use
This pertains to how easy the tool is to learn and use, as well as its robustness, stability, and efficiency. Additionally, it’s important to ensure that the tool can effectively automate complex scenarios, not just simple ones.
Platform Compatibility
Verify if the tool is compatible with multiple operating systems such as Windows, Mac, Linux, and others.
Web and Mobile Testing Support
Given that most businesses today require both web and mobile applications, it’s essential to ensure the tool has the capability to test Web and Mobile applications. It is also necessary to verify how simple it is to configure the tests for these platforms.
Features
It should be noted that while selecting the Codeless testing tool, efforts should be made to check that it contains features such as test creation and execution, support for data driven testing, compatibility testing, Cross Browser Testing, etc.
Reporting
The Codeless testing tool should provide a valuable report of the test execution with details such as error logs, videos, screenshots, test status, number of tests executed/Passed/Failed, etc.
AI Assistance
The tool should provide assistance by using AI technology to assist users on how to use the software. It should help you write, understand, or fix the code that is part of any test step that involves writing custom code.
Customer/Community Support
It should be verified that the tool provides excellent customer and technical support options, including FAQs, live chat, and comprehensive documentation. This will help in overcoming the obstacles faced while using the tool.
How to get started with Testim Codeless testing tool?
Testim Codeless testing tool by Tricentis is highly effective for automating Regression, Smoke, and Sanity Tests. Since these tests are repetitive and time-consuming, automating them allows testers to concentrate on more complex scenarios.
Using the record and playback feature of Testim, the tests can be automated quickly.
Following is an example of Codeless automated test creation using Testim:
Record a Test
The first step in automating the test is to record the test steps. These test steps will be used in future to replay the same test scenarios thus eliminating the manual intervention to test.
Creating your First Codeless Test in Testim Visual Editor can be of great help to start with the test recording
Add Validation
The basic essence of a test is to have something validated. This validation can prove whether the feature under test is performing what it is intended to do. Testim allows you to add validation to the tests by easily clicking on the required options provided inside the dashboard. User has to simply click on the Validation options and follow the screen to add the required validation for the test scenario.
Execute the Test
The tests could be executed in the required browsers/mobile devices. The tests can be run locally as well as using Testim cloud grid that provides a variety of browsers and its versions that could be used for running the tests.
Check the Report
Testim provides a comprehensive test report with all the test execution steps showing whether the test passed or failed. It also provides detailed insight around the test steps by providing details like expected validation and actual results.
Testim Copilot
Testim Copilot uses generative AI and helps in generating the JavaScript code automatically for the custom code steps. It is of great help to the Non-Technical testers as they can create test steps without having to write the code manually. On the other hand, Technical developers can also take advantage of this auto code generation without having to start from scratch.
The following primary functionalities are provided by Testim Copilot
Generate
Automatically generate custom steps from a text description using generative AI.
Explain
It allows explaining any JavaScript code and generates a clear description of it. This simplifies the code making the user understand with less effort, automates documentation and makes the code more reusable across tests and projects.
These features combine to make complex test creation easier, minimizing development efforts by reusing the standardized components. It also makes debugging and fixing broken tests simpler.
Benefits of Codeless Testing with Testim
The following are some of the benefits that could be achieved by performing Codeless testing
AI-Enhanced Test Creation
Codeless testing tools streamlines complex testing applications and automates code debugging by identifying issues and suggesting fixes. It also generates code documentation and explanations, simplifying the reuse of best practices.
Cross Browser/ Cross Platform testing at your fingertips
Codeless testing tools such as Testim provide support for Web as well as Mobile testing. This allows performing Cross browser as well as Cross Platform testing easily. Also, a single testing tool can be used to test both the Web as well as Mobile application, thus eliminating the maintenance overhead.
Scalability and Performance
As most of the codeless testing tools are available in the cloud, scalability is a key advantage of using these tools. It allows for the machine and its performance to be upgraded at any time based on requirements.
Test from Anywhere
With the tool hosted in the cloud, testing can be initiated from any location. After a one-time setup and configuration, you can simply log in and start writing and executing tests, as the test cases and scenarios are accessible from anywhere.
Cost Effective
As the tool is available on cloud, we save on costs associated with hardware and physical setup and only pay for the tool as you use it.
Conclusion
Codeless testing tools are a significant advantage for manual testers and non technical members in the team with little or no coding experience, as they don’t need technical expertise to use them. Also, no prior programming knowledge is required.
Testers and even non-technical persons such as Business Analysts, can design and automate test cases using the user interface and predefined components, which can enhance test coverage, speed up execution, and improve collaboration with team members and stakeholders. However, these tools have their limitations, which should be carefully evaluated and understood before implementing them for test automation.
Happy Testing!