A Short Guide to Stability Testing
A thriving business deserves a thriving software, and we at Q-Pros believe that software testing is the key to scale up businesses and create better results for both business owners and customers/users alike. One way software testing can help extend the functionality of an application is through Stability testing. In this article, we will define what stability testing is and its many benefits.
What is Stability Testing?
Stability testing is a type of non-functional software testing that helps measure an application’s ability to function continuously over lengthy periods.
The primary purpose of conducting stability tests is to ensure the software component does not collapse under a wide range of use over time.
One way to test the efficiency of the application is to run a stability test and ensure that the application is running well under circumstances beyond the average use. The intent here is to pressure the system to check its capabilities.
Why Do We Need Stability Tests?
In general, software testing helps us understand how the application will run under real-life situations, and we can find out what the limitations are, and how we can avoid future bottle-neck situations.
Stability tests give us the confidence to trust the system while knowing that it will maintain function even when used to the maximum.
Few issues are common in newly developed applications and mostly for justified reasons that are beyond the developer’s capabilities. Stability tests serve as an identifier of such issues and make us aware of the updates and fixes we can use to overcome them.
Some issues regarding performance will erupt due to heavy usage. These issues include a sudden or repetitive request on the application or having a massive amount of data being entered at once.
Stability Tests Outcomes
As is the case with other testing approaches, stability testing requires a lot of reporting and building for test cases. We must document a list of results and stats that include the following:
Hits per second – The number of demands or hits users would request; This gives us an understanding of the load percentage over the system.
Throughput – Throughput is measured in bytes. It is the amount of data that a user would receive over a fixed amount of time.
Memory – This is simply to document memory usage while conducting the test.
Transaction Response Times – The time it takes for the system to complete a request/response cycle as declared by the application. Response time is important to measure in general, and in stability tests, we make sure that it has the same value while the system is running under stress.
CPU – CPU utilization spent while performing the test.
Stability Tests Process
- Test planning: We start by defining a solid testing strategy, making sure to mention the objectives and milestones.
- Test case designs: We then create solid test cases and scenarios that can efficiently assess stability parameters.
- Test case review: Making sure that our test cases are validated against project requirements and technical specifications.
- Test execution: Perform the tests.
- Report results: Documenting all outcomes from executed tests to share with operational stakeholders.
Tools Used for Stability Tests
Several performance testing tools are suitable to test for stability. The most predominant tools used now are:
In Conclusion
It is certainly the goal of any application provider or business owner to have their applications scale up and be used by as many users as possible. Stability testing is a great way to scale up software. By doing a stability test we can guarantee that an application is more than ready to face future challenges.
Stability testing is part of other performance testing approaches that evaluate the system’s performance attributes and help us understand how a system would behave under fixed environments.
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