Software Testing Tools Blog – Testertools

Wind River, a world leader in embedded and mobile software, introduced an Android test development kit designed to assist in the validation of the device user experience by reproducing human interactions to test user interfaces. Wind River UX Test Development Kit is an Eclipse-based test-authoring environment enabling the rapid creation of automated test scripts for Android devices, applications and browser-based web content. The automated execution of these real-world tests can replace a significant amount of manual testing and reduce testing time.

“Among the motives for why consumers return their mobile devices, a top reason is a disappointing user experience. By using breakthrough Wind River innovation to construct efficient testing tools to develop reliable applications and fulfilling user experiences, operators and device manufacturers can create greater customer satisfaction to improve the bottom line,” said Cristina Segal, general manager of mobile Linux testing at Wind River. “Wind River is changing the user experience test paradigm. Wind River UX Test Development Kit tests are reusable across hardware configuration and software versions, helping to decrease the effort to build test scripts for new use cases by as much as 70 percent. With access to automatic tests that mimic human behavior during software testing, developers can dramatically reduce testing cycles and time-to-market.”

UX Test Development Kit automated tests manipulate the device like a real-world user by interacting with applications through the user interface. For example, a quality assurance engineer can automate scenarios to test the user experience when interacting with graphic interface elements such as dragging items or typing entries on a physical or virtual keyboard. Unlike legacy user interface testing solutions, the same test script can be used for Android devices with different hardware characteristics, allowing the quality assurance team to maintain the same test-case database whether the device under test is a smartphone, tablet or any other Android device. Test scripts authored using UX Test Development Kit are fully managed and automatically executed using Wind River Framework for Automated Software Testing (FAST) for Android, a comprehensive automated software testing solution for Android-based devices.

UX Test Development Kit includes abstract tests for standard Android applications such as browser, camera, contacts, media player and e-mail as well as sample test scripts for Android Market applications such as Google Maps, Facebook and Twitter. UX Test Development Kit also allows the rapid creation of test scripts that interact with HTML5 applications and web pages through the native Android browser. To facilitate troubleshooting, UX Test Development Kit tests also run an advanced debugging mechanism to track and more readily identify software issues.

A video demonstration of Wind River UX Test Development Kit can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhXMiit4Abo .

Wind River also launched the latest version of Wind River FAST for Android that can be used to test any Android-based device. Wind River FAST for Android offers new features that deliver easier handling and greater insights into the devices under test. Key features include the following:

– FAST Android Score, a benchmarking index that assesses a device’s performance via a quick comparison against Android reference devices, rapidly generates a score from a series of tests, incorporating the key performance driving components of an Android device, without having to run the entire set of FAST tests.

– Easy-to-use wizard tools allow quick board configuration and test creation.

– Monitoring features illustrate CPU usage, memory load and power consumption.

– Expanded set of test assets created to test battery life, update mechanism for Android, Stagefright media framework and additional audio and video media capabilities.

A video demonstration of the latest features for Wind River FAST for Android is available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmwYnz92XkM . Additional information about Wind River FAST for Android can be found at http://www.windriver.com/products/mobile-linux/fast.html .

Wind River, a world leader in embedded and mobile software, today announced that it has achieved “Ready for IBM Rational Software” technical validation for Wind River Test Management, a test automation system for monitoring, executing and managing embedded device software testing. This validation provides IBM Rational customers with assurance that Wind River Test Management has met IBM Rational’s requirements for safety, interoperability, and user experience, and integrates seamlessly with IBM Rational Quality Manager.

“A lifecycle quality management solution based on the integration will help companies improve their ROI and collaboration across the development lifecycle, reduce costs by increasing automation, and provide better visibility to project status, leading to higher quality and on-time deliveries.”

The Wind River integration enables bi-directional traceability between requirements and tests as part of the overall software development lifecycle in the Rational Software and Systems Engineering solution. Wind River Test Management allows users to discover un-tested requirements and automatically identify test suites that are impacted by requirements changes. It then generates an optimized test suite comprised of the minimum set of tests that are required to run based on code changes. By focusing test time and resources on what really needs testing, these features provide optimal balance between cost, time, quality and risk, and increased quality of software embedded in complex devices.

“We are very pleased to announce this formal validation between Wind River and IBM Rational Quality Manager, which allows us to extend our test automation specialization to Rational customers,” said Ido Sarig, vice president of product marketing at Wind River. “A lifecycle quality management solution based on the integration will help companies improve their ROI and collaboration across the development lifecycle, reduce costs by increasing automation, and provide better visibility to project status, leading to higher quality and on-time deliveries.”

“The integration of Wind River’s patented technology with Rational Quality Manager will help product development teams manage business risks using a lifecycle quality management approach,” said Michael Loria, vice president, IBM Rational Business Development. “With this integrated solution, users can provide quality management across the whole development lifecycle through the Rational Software and Systems Engineering solution, as well as execute testing where it matters most.”

Wind River will present and exhibit at IBM’s Innovate 2011 Conference in Orlando, FL this week. Please visit Wind River Booth #524 to see a demonstration of Wind River Test Management and the integration with IBM Rational Quality Manager. Additional information about Wind River Test Management is available at www.windriver.com/products/test_management.

Intel subsidy Wind River, which sells embedded and mobile software, has introduced updated versions of its Wind River Platform for Android and Wind River (News – Alert) Framework for Automated Software Testing for Android “to help developers deliver Android devices to market quickly and reliably,” in the words of company officials.

Additionally, Wind River Platform for Android (News – Alert), a commercial software platform based on the Android software development kit, includes upgrade paths to future Android releases, company officials say, “including Gingerbread and Honeycomb to support a wider range of devices such as tablets.”

Michael Krutz, vice president of worldwide solutions and services at Wind River, said in the rush to develop Android devices, “device manufacturers must still contend with product development issues such as software quality and Android compliance, while also building distinctive and innovative products.” He added that Wind River provides software to develop Android devices “so device manufacturers can focus the majority of their efforts on the differentiating features that set their products apart from the competition.”

What this means is that Wind River Platform for Android now includes DLNA Digital Media Server (DMS) functionality. This lets an Android device act as a DMS and share its media files, such as movies, music or photos, with other networked DLNA-certified devices across a digital home. Calling it “a key differentiator for larger screen Android devices,” company officials say the Wind River Platform for Android offers a multi-windowing experience, “such as concurrent active application windows, windows movement, resizing and theme support.”

According to a report in EE Times Asia, Wind River reveals the Framework for Automated Software Testing (FAST) for Android -based devices.

Customizable for different silicon architectures, it can work across any device manufacturer or operator in need of testing Android software stacks. The test solution claims to streamline and automate the software testing process, thus reducing time and cost to develop Android devices, while improving software quality and stability, and helping users verify and prove compliance with Android Compatibility Test Suite, or CTS.

Targeted for operators, device manufacturers, independent software vendors and silicon providers who need to test Android-based devices, FAST reduces the time and costs associated with testing software by automating thousands of heterogeneous tests and then consolidating the results into a single uniform database, easily accessible using virtually any reporting tool. Thus, manufacturers can focus efforts and resources on developing features that will differentiate their mobile devices from the competition and verifying Android compliancy, instead of spending a majority of their development time on testing.

FAST tests span a wide range of categories including graphics and boot-time, interoperability for Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, telephony and board support package tests. The company’s test library provides coverage of tested code from low level, middleware and up to the application level.

For more information please visit EE Times Asia