Linha de processo de software para apoiar testes em aplicações móveis

Abstract

The evolution of mobile applications in recent years has resulted in a constant challenge for the Software Engineering area. The exponential growth of this market and the criticality of the developed systems impose a greater attention to quality aspects of these applications, such as which test technique to apply to certain types of applications. Software testing consumes a significant amount of project resources and development cycle time. Normal test costs range from 40% to 85%, according to the application's criticality. Therefore, any inititive to reduce the effort, time, or cost of the development cycle should include the testing process, and this should be tailored according to the characteristics of the application under test. As an alternative to support this scenario, this work proposes the development of a Software Process Line (SPrL) in order to simplify the control of variabilities and enable the derivation of new mobile application testing processes, assisting the test manager/leader in the selection of test elements (i.e. activities, test types, test level, responsible for activities, phases and tools), taking into account the specificities of each application. The tool called MTPLT (Mobile Testing Process Line Tool) was developed with the aim of providing the necessary tooling support to the manager/test leader, facilitating the manipulation of data related to the application and aid in decision making regarding the process to be adopted. The MTPLT was evaluated by experts in software testing in order to verify its feasibility in industry environments. As a result, it was observed a tendency to acceptance when observed the requirements perceived utility and ease of use. In the perceived utility, 46 positive responses were obtained against 4 negative responses. When analyzing ease of use, 30 positive and only 3 negative responses were obtained. Analyses were carried out evaluating profiles, experience times and roles performed. Most of the participants with previous experience on the industry and researchers presented considerations regarding the presentation of content and the addition of features.