End to End Testing

October 04, 2019

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What is meant by the End to End Testing?

End to End testing technique is carried out on the whole system in order to ensure the streamlined and correct work-flow of the software product from beginning to end w.r.t. specified business requirements. This testing is done to evaluate the desired work flow and expected functioning of the software product at all levels or layers, right from the beginning to till its end against the given requirements.

Moreover, it is used to assess the inter-dependencies feature of the software or system along with the veracity of the data and information that are being passed between the various components of the system at each different layer.

Further, this type of testing ensures the system's integration and communication with the external interfaces like other systems, applications, hardware, database etc. in the real-environment.

Why End-to-End Testing of the system is needed?

In the present era almost all software application or system needs to be connected with the external entities or sub-systems in order to perform efficiently. These links up with the external entities such as external systems or applications, server, database, hardware, etc. set up within or outside the boundaries of the organization has developed a complicated situation where a single failure of any entity may produce detrimental results and may even lead to the break-down of the software application or system.

Thus, End-to-end testing provides the best possible solution to prevent the system from such type of risks.

End-to-End Testing Types

The technique of performing end-to-end testing of a software application or a system may be carried out using two different approaches:

• Horizontal End-to-End Testing:

Encompasses all different and multiple applications and modules associated within and outside the targeted system.

• Vertical End-to-End Testing:

This form targets one particular application or module of the system at a time to evaluate & assess various processes and features associated with that application.

How to perform End-to-End Testing?

Generally, this type of testing consists of following activities

• Detailed study and analysis of the business requirements.
• Setting up of the testing environment along with the study of hardware and software requirements.
• Defining and describing the process of software system along with its subsystem.
• Listing and assigning the roles and responsibilities for all the systems including sub-systems involved in it.
• Description of methods and standards to be implemented in the test.
• Designing test cases along with the traceability matrix for tracing the requirements.
• Documenting and preserving the inputs and outputs for each system.

End to End Testing Metrics:

End to end testing uses following metrics:

1. Status of test case preparation:

It is used to determine the actual position of the test cases that are under preparation in comparison to planned with the help of charts, graphs, etc.

2. Weekly tracking the progress of Test:

It ensures the monitoring of the percentage of test completed against what is planned in terms of passed, failed, valid, invalid test cases, etc., on a weekly-basis.

3. Status of Defects:

This involves the report generation of the status of open and closed defects based on their severity on a daily basis.

4. Availability of the Test Environment:

This compares the time allotted for performing end to end testing in the test environment and actual operational time of the testing in the environment.

Key Points in End to End Testing:

• It involves examination of the work-flow for the whole process of the system right from the starting till its end, at all layers of the applications which may include testing of interfaces, correct data communication between the subsystems and the complete back-end system such as database.
• It is different from system testing as former verifies and validates overall system requirement along with the internal and external integration and communication between the sub-systems whereas the latter is restricted to testing the complete and fully-integrated system only.
• Generally this testing is carried out after executing the functional and system testing.
• Manual testing is preferred for executing the test cases as it is complex and difficult to automate all the external interfaces of the system.
• Testers must have detailed and thorough knowledge of the system along with its subsystem.
• Evaluates the actual working of the system in the real environment involving network communication, interaction with the database system, etc. Thus this testing may be considered best for the commercial release of the software.