What should be considered for Test Automation of Telecom Applications?

The telecom sector is witnessing a rapid transformation with the advent of new technologies like the Internet of Things (IoT), Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), Cloud Computing, and many more. The telecom sector is at the core of keeping the globe a connected place. Its role in facilitating communication through data, voice, internet service, or media broadcast is immense. Telecom operators face challenges of keeping the cost at an optimal level while delivering the best quality services.

Similar to other sectors, telecom applications are increasingly being used by various stakeholders to connect, communicate, transact, and manage various activities. Catering to segments like ISPs, satellite communication, and wireless communication, among others, the telecom sector focuses on offering customized solutions. With 5G technology in the offing, telecom companies have to augment capacities in their networks to implement the groundbreaking technologies of the future. Moreover, to ensure seamless execution of activities such as subscriber migration, device acceptance, and new network rollouts, among others, telecommunication software testing should be the norm. With attributes like speed and quality being increasingly sought by customers, test automation for telecom has become a mandatory requirement to stay competitive.

Why should telecom applications need QA testing?

As telecom applications have to straddle a host of testing standards, network elements, devices, and protocols to deliver services they should be subjected to rigorous telecom testing. The core reasons to employ test automation for telecom are:

• With telecom companies embracing new technologies to deliver a better quality of services, their profit margins seem to be declining. The companies should consider going for digital transformation, as the ICT sector, to manage organizational flexibility. Testing services for telecom industry can effectively validate the value chain of the industry and enable the applications to deliver the right output
• With a growing subscriber base and the launch of new products, services, and customized solutions, services like customer care, service configuration, order fulfillment, and billing are getting more complex. Timely testing the applications can fix any inherent glitches and make them secure, stable, reliable, and usable.
• A few critical areas for the telecom application to manage are network inventory and configuration, service provisioning, and fault management. The operation of end-to-end solutions is supported by Business Support Systems (BSS) and Operation Support Systems (OSS). Telecom software testing can address any underlying issue and help deploy the application.
• Telecom applications need to address challenges emerging out of cybersecurity threats. The threats are multiplying due to the expansion of IT connectivity with data and voice services. Telecom application testing services can validate the functioning of applications, identify and remove glitches, and achieve customer satisfaction.
• Telecom applications are integrated with IVR systems and automated chatbots to deliver superior customer experiences. By employing telecom network testing all telecom-related services can be optimized including reducing the number of customer complaints. This can lead to higher customer retention.

Considerations before implementing test automation for telecom applications

Given the complexity of telecom applications and the varied ecosystem they need to operate in, any manual testing exercise can remain highly inadequate. It is only through test automation that greater coverage, improved accuracy, and savings on time and money can be achieved. However, before implementing automation in telecom testing the below-mentioned preparedness can do a world of good to the testers.

• Ensure if the automation approach is easy-to-use, cost-effective, and the quality management framework is able to execute most VoIP, video test equipment, and TDM. Moreover, the framework should be able to control the devices under test through GUI interfaces and CLI commands.
• The test automation suite has the latest tools for enabling authoring, integration, regression, script porting, and report generation.
• Given the transformation of legacy systems and networks of various telcos to support multimedia and IP services, IoT, VR and AR, the test automation suite should be able to validate new network elements quickly.
• Properly identifying and segregating the test cases that need to be automated.
• Test automation should be a coordinated affair with scheduling, executing, and reporting managed in a multi-user environment.
• Ensure if the test case platform operable through the web-based GUI allows the development of generic test cases instead of machine-specific scripts.
• Ensure if a robot-based automation framework for acceptance testing is available.
• With the move towards the adoption of 5G where latency times of sub milliseconds will be the norm, defining the number of verifiable use cases and orchestrating them becomes important to implement test automation.

Conclusion

Telecom testing services will have a greater salience with the sector going for the transformation of its systems and processes. With the spread of the 5G network slowly but steadily, the implementation of test automation will become critical to validate telecom applications across devices, networks, platforms, and configurations while enabling greater customer satisfaction and profitability for the companies.

Article Source: dev.to

James Daniel is a software Tech enthusiastic & works at Cigniti Technologies I'm having a great understanding of today's software testing quality