The thought process of doing mobile app testing

Testers are often seen as bug hunters, but have you ever wondered how they actually test? Are you curious what exactly they all do and how they can be valuable in a typical technology project?

Walk you through the tester's thought process and explore the various considerations they have when testing mobile apps. The purpose of this article is to uncover this thought process for testers and to demonstrate the breadth and depth of what they typically think about.

Testers need to ask questions: A tester's core competency lies in asking challenging, relevant questions. If you can combine research and questioning skills with technical and product knowledge, you will gradually become a good tester too.

Testers may ask:
1. What platform should this app be used on?
2. What does this app do?
3. What will happen if I do this?

Where to start testing

Ideally , testers should have all the latest details on the product being tested. But in reality it's rare, so, like everyone else, testers are limited to what they have at hand. But that's no excuse for not being able to test! Testers can actually gather information from a variety of internal and external sources.

At this stage, testers can ask these questions:
1. What information is there: Specifications? Project meeting? User documentation? Knowledgeable team members? Is there a support forum or a company online forum to help? Is there a record of existing bugs?
2. What system, platform and device is the application running and tested on?
3. What type of data does the app handle (such as personal information, credit cards, etc.)?
4. Does the application integrate with external applications (such as APIs and data sources)?
5. Does the app need to use a specific mobile web page?
6. How do existing consumers evaluate this product?
7. How much time is available for testing?
8. What are the priorities and risks of testing?
9. Which users are unpleasant to use and why?
10. How to publish and update?

Based on the information gathered above, the tester can develop a test plan. Usually the budget determines the test method. The test method is definitely different in one day, one week or one month. As you become more familiar with the team, the workflow, and how these kinds of problems are solved, it becomes easier to predict outcomes.

Tester Creativity

You may know what this app is meant to do, but what exactly can it do? How do users actually use it? Mobile testers often test with different user personas—a bit of an exaggeration, of course, but the ability to think, analyze, and imagine oneself as different users is instructive for testing.

Testers might imagine themselves as: inexperienced; very experienced; hobbyist; hacker; competitor.

Of course there are many more optional roles, it mainly depends on what product you are developing. In fact, in addition to role characteristics, its operational behavior and workflow are also very important. People often use products in strange ways, such as:
1. Returning when they shouldn't;
2. Impatient and hitting keys multiple times;
3. Entering wrong data;
4. Not understanding what to do;
5. Probably not Set up as required;
6. May be self-righteous and think you know what to do.

When testers encounter these problems, they often find unexpected bugs. Sometimes these bugs are trivial, but deeper investigation reveals more serious problems.

Many questions can be predetermined and tested. When doing app testing , the following questions are not all relevant, but you can also try to ask:
1. Are you doing what you say?
2. Is the task completed as designed?
3. Isn't the task completed as designed?
4. What will happen if it is always used or under load? Will it be unresponsive? Will it crash? Will it be updated? Have feedback?
5. Will crash reports be fed back to the app?
6. What creative, logical, or passive navigation styles might users have? Do users trust your brand?
7. How safe is the user's data?
8. Is it possible to be interrupted or cracked?
9. What happens when running to the limit?
10. Will you be asked to open related services (such as GPS, Wi-Fi)? What if the user opens it? What if it doesn't open?
11. Where to redirect users? to the web? Or from webpage to app? Will this cause problems?
12. Are the communication process and market feedback consistent with the function, design and content of the app?
13. What is the login process like? Can I log in directly on the app or go to the web page?

Testing is not right or wrong

Testing is considered to be completely logical, plannable and predictable, and the process includes: test scripts and test plans, pass and fail, correct and wrong feedback. After going through these testing procedures, it is not far from the truth.