5 Major Differences between Functional and Non-Functional Testing Explained

Posted on January 4, 2016

While testing a software application, testers have to focus on both functional and non-functional requirements. They need to perform various types of functional tests to ensure that the software meets all business requirements. Likewise, they also need to assess the application’s user experience by performing a variety of tests against the non-functional requirements. That is why, it is important for the testers to understand some of the major differences between these two types of software testing.

5 Important Differences between Functional and Non-Functional Testing

1) Objective

As a type of black-box testing, functional testing is performed to check it the application meets all predefined business requirements and specification. The outcome of functional testing helps managers to decide if the software is ready for release. On the other hand, non-functional testing is performed to assess the application’s user experience. The testers perform a variety of tests against non-functional requirements to determine the amount of time required by the application to perform specific actions or respond to user request.

2) Types of Tests

A business has to perform both functional and non-functional testing to make the software popular and profitable in the longer run. So the testers need to perform usability, regression testing, smoke testing, and sanity testing to decide if the application is ready for release. At the same time, they also need to assess the application’s behaviour and user experience by performing a variety of non-functional tests like stress, load/performance, compatibility, reliability, compliance, and security testing. However, the types of functional and non-functional tests to be performed will differ from one project to another based on the nature and usage of the software.

3) Identifying Defects in the Software

Often the features and functionality of a software application is impacted by bugs, defects or flaws in it. These defects further prevent the software from meeting business requirements exactly and effectively. So the testers have to perform functional tests to identify the bugs or defects in the software, and get these eliminated without any delay. But the testers are not required to focus on finding bugs or defects in the software while performing non-functional testing. They have to perform tests against the application’s non-functional requirements to assess its behaviour and user experience.

4) Both Negative and Positive Testing

Normally, non-functional testing is performed based on a number of criteria that are not considered while performing functional testing. The tests performed against these criterions help testers to assess the quality of the software from the perspective of multiple users. But the testers have to perform both positive and negative functional testing. While performing positive functional testing, they have to submit valid inputs, and check how the application responds to these valid inputs accurately, and generate the desire outputs. Likewise, they also need to perform negative functional testing using invalid inputs, invalid operations, and unexpected operating conditions.

5) Test Automation Tools

An enterprise can automate both functional and non-functional testing efforts. In addition to reducing the testing time, the tools further help testers to perform the tests repeatedly. But often businesses find it easier to automate the non-functional testing. The testers can use a variety of tool to perform load, performance, stress and compatibility testing quickly and repeatedly. However, the testers have to write additional test scripts to perform both positive and negative functional testing through the tools. It is always important for the business to pick the right test automation tools to automate each type of testing effectively.

On the whole, the software testing strategy of a business has to focus on both functional and non-functional requirements of the applications. At the same time, it is also important for the testers to understand the objectives of each type of testing clearly to assess the software application more effectively.

What is JIRA and how does it help testers?

Posted on December 18, 2015

In addition to implementing a comprehensive software testing strategy, the businesses also need to manage the regular testing activities efficiently. Many businesses nowadays use customized tools to effectuate test management in agile environment. Atlassian has designed JIRA with features to help businesses to effectuate project management in an agile environment. At the same time, the commercial tool also makes it easier for QA professionals to track a variety of bugs and issues. There are also a number of reasons why JIRA is hugely popular among both enterprises and QA professionals.

Features that Differentiate JIRA from Other Project Management Tools

Refer Anything as an Issue

As noted earlier, JIRA helps testers to track a variety of issues and bugs. It further allows users to treat anything as an issue. For instance, the users can refer a software bug, any specific project task, a leave request form, or a helpdesk   ticket as an issue. So they can use the software to track and mange all aspects of the software testing project.

Categorize and Link Issues

JIRA further allows testers to categorize and link various issues in a flexible way. They can categorize individual issues by assigning them to a specific component or version. The labeling makes it easier for users to find issues based on their labels. Likewise, the users can establish connection between two distinct issues hosted on the same or different servers.

Clone Original Issues

JIRA allows testers to clone individual issues. So they can easily duplicate the original issue, and allow multiple users to access and manipulate a single issue simultaneously. The clone issue can also be connected with the original issue efficiently to accommodate the changes made by multiple users. The software further allows testers to differentiate the cloned issues by adding relevant information like description, summary, issue type, priority, environment, assignee and reporter.

Create Two Types of Boards

JIRA allows agile teams to create and manage issues efficiently using boards. The testers can refer to the custom boards to monitor issues from a single or multiple projects from a single place. They also have option to create two different types of boards, i.e., Scrum and Kanban. The scrum boards help users to focus on iterative and incremental chunks of work. On the other hand, kanban boards make it easier for testers to monitor the workflow and reduce work-in-progress to deliver maximum output on a continuous basis.

Use Filters, Add-ons and APIs

JIRA further effectuates agile testing project management by providing a variety of add-ons and APIs. The testers have option to customize and extend the software by downloading plug-and-play add-ons from the Atlassian Marketplace. Likewise, they can use a variety of APIs to integrate JIRA with other tools used by the agile team. At the same time, the programmers can simplify the software by writing custom filters in JIRA Query Language (JQL).

Make Data-Driven Decisions

The project managers need to monitor teams, resources and projects consistently to manage software testing process efficiently. They can use JIRA as a project management tool to create realistic roadmap for the project, while monitoring the teams, resources and project continuously. JIRA can even be used by managers to take various data-driven decisions quickly.

Generate Different Types of Reports

JIRA further helps testers to generate a wide variety of reports to facilitate decision making. The reports can also be used by various stakeholders in the project to take crucial decisions. Based on their requirements, the users have option to generate recently created issues, resolution time, resolved vs. created issues, time tracking, and user workload reports. They can even use pie charts present the information in a more appealing and readable format.

However, each enterprise has to incur additional expensed to avail these benefits of JIRA. Atlassian allows business to choose from several pricing options according to their team size and requirements. At the same time, the users also have option to host the software on their servers or in the cloud. So it becomes easier for businesses to use JIRA without spending a lot of money.