ROBUSTNESS TESTING

What is Robustness testing?

Software has many features that are to be tested under system testing. Hence there are many different types of system testing. It is a huge list with more than 100 different types of testing that can be listed. Robustness testing is a quality assurance testing methodology to test the robustness of the software application. Here the testing is done by giving the invalid inputs. Robustness testing is usually done to test the exceptional handling.

Example for robustness testing with invalid inputs:

For example, when testing is done for test cases, nominal values are fixed as two variables and change the third value of the variable. Lets say, we will fix the nominal values for X and Y and make the combinations for Z of each value. The nominal values for X and Y are 50 and 40 and we can compare these two values with the given values of Z as 79, 80, 89, 90, 99, 100 and 101. We will fix the nominal values for X and Z as 50, 60 and make the combination with these two values with the given values of Y as 19, 0, 21, 40, 59, 60, 61 and we will fix the value of Y and Z as 40 and 90 and make the combination with value of X as -1, 0, 1, 50, 99, 100, 101. And many test cases will be generated with different combinations.

Robustness testing scenarios:

There are certain scenarios that can cause the failure of software due to lack of robustness of software. The scenarios that can be tested are:

invalid inputs
interfaces with new software modules or external and independent software
changes in environment, sometimes can be a sudden change- hardware of software environment
external environment changes affecting the hardware system like magnetic fields, electric fields, pollution etc.

Benefits of Robustness Testing:

A various business organisations use Robustness testing for their projects for the benefits like:

Better project analysis: Before a particular design is finalised, all available data from analysis stage are reviewed to make them more effective and useful. The robust analysis stage will perform the quality checker if a particular idea is good enough to be pushed through the next stage.
Better design: If a robust analysis testing is done before any design is finalised certainly it will yield a better result and better design options.

Challenges for performing the Robustness testing:

There are many challenges to carry out the robustness testing. The limited duration allocated for testing and repetitive tests to be conducted for testing robustness. The key challenge involving an automation tool is that they are designed for some specific task. Therefore there will be possibility of lack of flexibility. There is a lack of adaptiveness of the systems the struggle to apply the principle of redundancy in order to structure according to the current requirement. Even the logic of any piece of code gets corrected but still the complexity increases with the time the ANSI and IEEE has defined the robustness testing as creative work, in which a system component functions correctly under invalid input or stressful environmental conditions. There is a chance of crashing system when the complete system is produced.

Significance of Robustness testing:

The significance of Robustness testing is that it ensures, that the software system qualifies as the end product developed right purpose. The complete software system consists of many components. Such a kind of testing ensures reducing cost and time required for the efficient delivery of software system. Robustness testing is carried by passing valid and invalid input to check the performance of software. The system is tested with different inputs and verified under different conditions.

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