ERP Testing Project

Today ERP packaged applications upgrades introduce significant risks into the core business of large organizations. When existing packaged applications have to be modified, most important risks are related to the functional gaps that may appear between the different implementations of the application.

Upward compatibility and business continuity are crucial when some critical business processes are changed. This context makes regression testing difficult. Nevertheless, efficient IT governance has to be achieved and controlled regression testing is required.

 

 

  ERP project stackeholders are facing challenges today:

• Manual scripting and recording of actionable tests is of low value to the ERP projects. This can be a very costly and time-consuming task, and discourages early and frequent testing in projects. In agile development, the cost of test implementation for each iteration may be prohibitive and lead to insufficient testing.
  
  
• Waiting for the ERP application to be ready for testing before designing and implementing the tests is bad practice. The tests will not check alignment of the implemented applications on the initial ERP application design. Waiting for the application to be ready for testing also reduces the number of possible tests which leads to late detection of errors.
  
  
• Change management increases the risk of tests being out of line with the ERP application design. Keeping the tests and applications aligned upon change is usually difficult because they are typically managed in various processes and rely on independent technologies. Regression testing and test changes make change management costly.
  

ERP projects QA Managers know that risks for regression due to changes in test cases and test scripts are high. The business layer application requirements should be independent of the technology changes and of the implementation decisions.

Typically, the process of changing the test scripts in order to adapt to technology changes is a low value-added task. The approach of maintaining tests when business requirements change is costly time-consuming, and degrades IT productivity and responsiveness. Smartesting® improves the regression testing productivity and helps reducing related risks.

The Smartesting® solution generates the tests independently of the application technical implementation.

• Firstly, it relies on the modeling of the application behavior, which is not tied to technical changes. Tests based on the same modeling can be generated for various implementations, releases and versions of a single application which ensures efficient regression testing.
  

• Secondly, the solution relies on technical mapping for the technology involved. Mapping to the targeted test technology is performed automatically by Smartesting® only when test execution is needed. Business requirements derived tests can be designed with Smartesting® without needing to touch executable test scripts.
  
  

Smartesting® mitigates ERP Testing risk, by automating the test generation based on application UML modeling. It fully industrializes the test process, from Information System design to test design and from test design to test script implementation.

Smartesting® interfaces with both the UML modeling tools and with the test management and automation tools. Automated generation ensures consistency of the application and test design, as well as consistency with test implementation.

Smartesting® facilitates change management because it continually adds value when the application is being updated and, once the tests have been modeled. The availability of a durable test repository significantly lowers the cost of regression testing.