Software Testing Arsenal v1.0

It's been almost a year since day one of me working as an SQA Engineer at a software development company here in the Philippines and I must say that I really learned a lot. Going out of my forte as a penetration tester, I managed to experience other types of testing methodologies, test out multiple projects, and learn from my colleagues at work.

Prior to this engagement, I didn't have any experience with Software Quality Assurance, and I must say, those Youtube videos and free learning or training resources did really helped me a lot in gaining insights, fundamental knowledge, and skills.

Relevance of Software Testing Tools

Like any other profession, certain tools are needed to accomplish some necessary tasks. Either to maximize time, reduce effort, or reduce costs. In the software testing industry, there are several testing techniques that are covered and needs to be conducted depending on the test requirements and project specifications. Before reaching the end users, intensive software testing is done in order to identify the issues that the developing project upholds. With this in mind, time is one huge factor. The faster the QA personnel does his/her tests and with precision, sprint deadlines will surely be met.

Software testing is one vital part of the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) process that's why the QA personnel needs to fully understand the end users or client audience to come up with the necessary test cases that will help in improving and meeting their satisfaction.

Without further ado...

Software Arsenal v1.0

Chrome, Edge, and Firefox are your best buddies!

Yep, I said it, no tests are done on your web application if you can't access it locally via a browser and for that case, having these power-trio really helps. You can basically add up Safari in here, but since I'm using a Windows machine, I'm somehow bias on these ones. Anyhow, there are some bugs that are non-existent on Chrome, but is present on the Firefox and Edge. Vice versa.

Each of these browsers can be added with plug-ins as well. Mainly, when I conduct certain tests using some plugins and utilizing the browser's DevTools, Chrome is my goto browser for that.

Browserstack

I typically use Browserstack when doing cross-browser confirmatory and exploratory testing.

WebPageTest

WebPageTest is a free website speed test tool that uses real browsers and consumer connection speeds to do a free website speed test from various places around the world. It enables QA specialists to conduct both basic or advanced test, which may include multi-step transactions, video capture, content blocking, and other features.

PageSpeed Insights (PSI)

PageSpeed Insights (PSI) generates data on the performance of the mobile and desktop devices' web pages, but only according to Google's speed standards. It also offers tips about how to make the page better.

Chrome Plugins

  • VisBug - An open source plugin tool on Chrome for real-time design interactions and hotkeys on the browser.

  • Window Resizer - For simulation of different screen resolutions by automatically resizing the browser window in one click.

  • Ghostery - A powerful privacy extension. Block ads, stop trackers and speed up websites.

  • Wappalyzer - Identifies the tech stack used by the current web page.

  • Grammarly - Helps in checking grammatical errors. Also detects and suggests better sentence and wording structure.

  • Loom - A recording tool to conduct Proof-of-Concepts on found webpage UI or functionality issues.

LICEcap

LICEcap is an intuitive, flexible, and handy tool for animated screen captures since its output can be a GIF file. One alternative for Loom and is useful when doing exploratory testing.

Burp Suite Community Edition

Burp Suite Community Edition is a powerful tool that I use when doing security audits. It captures requests and manipulate it. It also has different plugins associated with it that you can play and tinker around when doing penetration testing on a web or mobile application.

Postman

Postman - I normally use Postman when conducting API tests if such web application utilizes APIs for backend.

Insomnia

Insomnia - An alternative for Postman, but with intuitive and simplistic interface.

Visual Studio

Visual Studio - Equipped with Selenium and other packages for Automation Testing. This is the IDE that I use when coding for test scripts necessary to automate repetitive test cases.

Ending Notes

Don't be overwhelmed by the number of tools listed in here. These tools are easy-to-use and can be mastered with constant usage. As long as you continue in progressing forward by honing your skills, learning new concepts, and maintaining it, you will surely master such tools in no time.

These are just some of the software that I use in my day-to-day tasks as a Software Quality Assurance Engineer and there are still more to be shared as I progress further in this journey, hence, the 'version numbers' in the title. Ciao!