Adequate testing is necessary before bringing a software product to market. Software testing is the process of modeling any user action scenario to look for developer bugs. The purpose of testing is to check that the software or application acts according to technical requirements and is free of bugs. These mistakes can cause irreversible losses in terms of time, data, material resources and human resources.
The test should quickly find as many application errors as possible. This is an important stage of software quality assurance, aimed at a thorough examination of the program code and the detection of errors in its operation. The software is reviewed by test engineers who try the end-user role, simulate the situations suitable for the test cases, and record the result.
There are two types of testing you can choose for your project: manual and automated testing. In this article, we’ll talk about manual testing processes and their pros and cons.
What is Manual Testing
Manual Testing is the procedure to check that everything in the program is working as planned. This can require a personnel employed in this field. These People click on the links and enter values in the fields, verify the output and manually push the buttons. Their job is to find bugs or other problems and report them so that software developers can find and fix them. As it can be understood from its definition, it is a completely people-oriented approach.
Depending on how the test is performed, there are different types of manual tests that can be run, such as:
- System test
- Integration test
- Acceptance tests
- Unit test
- Black box testing
- White box testing
The type of manual testing used is often determined by when testing is performed within the software development lifecycle (SDLC).
Manual test types
There are several types of manual testing you may need for your project:
Research testing: This testing method is when the development and execution of tests occur simultaneously. A test person does not have a predefined scenario and executes the procedure without strictly following a plan. For example, it’s up to the tester to decide which details in the program’s functionality he will check. The Research test is about exploration, in which the creative intuition of the tester plays a crucial role.
Ad-hoc testing: The previous type of testing is often confused with this type of testing. Ad-hoc is improvisation, a spontaneous search for errors and mistakes. It is done without planning and documentation and can be applied for both research and commercial projects.
Usability testing. Usability testing checks whether the product is suitable for interaction. Usability testing is essential at every stage of development to see how real users will perceive your product. During the experiment, a group of people is asked to complete typical tasks to dedect if the product behaves according to their needs and expectations.
User Acceptance Test. This method is performed by the end users of the system to decide whether the product is ready for release. It checks whether the system is working according to user scenarios. This is the final stage of testing. UAT must occur with real users, stakeholders do not fit into this group. The process of obtaining approval from the customer is called stakeholder feedback.
Manual testing can be applied to a wide variety of situations, as can be seen from the methods we briefly mentioned. Now let’s see exactly where it is most useful.
Manual Testing Pros & Cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| easy recruiting (anyone can test) | may not detect all flaws |
| requires almost zero investment | not reusable |
| versatile, applicable to many test scenarios | highly specialized for complex cases |
| close to real user feedback | takes a lot of time |
| flexible, easily adapts to changes in the user interface | lower quality in case of large volume tests |
| Recommendable for Usability Testing | Performance testing is impractical |
Advantages of Manual Testing
Manual testing is a classic approach to software quality assurance. However, there are cases where the human entity performs much better than scripted tests:
Cost-efficiency
In the short term, manual testing is cheaper and more cost-effective. This profession has a low threshold. Companies can hire beginners or low experienced staff and train them in a short time. Almost anyone can become a manual tester. With this type of testing, you don’t need to invest in expensive software and a team of qualified software developers to get good results.
Versatility
Human predictions and experience enable control of specialized software components that a computer cannot. In difficult situations, humans do much better than machines.
Recommended for dynamically changing GUI designs.
Test Automation is not recommended if the application’s GUI is changing dynamically. The test staff will adapt to the new interface much faster.
Real user feedback
Automation testing has many benefits, but there are some areas where they become useless. Human expertise is valuable to provide real feedback on the usability and comfort of the user interface. If you get the test staff to act like your customer, you can get an approximate opinion of one of the users about the product.
Disadvantages of manual testing
There are cases where manual testing has some disadvantages. In some cases, you will need to evaluate the pros and cons of each testing approach and choose the more cost-effective one.
Human factor
This is why automation testing came about in the first place. When working with people, you are more likely to find no errors or bugs. They may be biased, tired, or unqualified. If you want to be sure of your software quality, you need to invest in the development of your staff or seek qualified experts.
Low Accuracy
Human Users (Testers) can make mistakes, so we cannot expect more accuracy in Manual Testing. If it is Test Automation / Self Test, the test tool can provide the correct output if you provide the correct logic.
Volume Limitation
If you need to test a large-scale software system, manual testers cannot deal with such volumes. You can expand your team and employ more manual testers. However, if we are talking about very broad products, it is more cost effective to automate at least some of your tests.
Time Consuming
If you only use manual testing for all quality assurance work, it can take a lot of time. Employees will need to check every item and report problems, which takes more time than just running a script.
Performance testing is impractical
It is practically difficult to organize thousands of Machine/Computer and Human Users. Test Automation, on the other hand, can create thousands of Virtual users and apply the Payload using 3 or 4 Computers and test the performance of the Application.