Test Environment

Definition

A test environment is any development environment that is primarily used to perform incremental and iterative system testing on an evolving application.

Objectives

The typical objectives of the test environment are to provide the necessary infrastructure to enable the:

• Independent test team to perform:
  • Functional Testing
  • Performance Testing
  • Load Testing
  • Stress Testing
  • Robustness Testing
  • Configuration Testing
  • Contention Testing
  • Availability Testing
  • Portability Testing (requires multiple clients and servers)
• Security team to perform initial security testing.
• User experience team to perform system usability testing.

Benefits

The typical benefits of the test environment include:

• An integrated test environment improves the efficiency of system testing.
• A separate test environment enables system testing to proceed in parallel with development, integration, and launch testing.

Contents

The typical contents of the test environment are:

• Hardware Components:
  • System test team workstations
  • System testing server
  • Portability testing servers
  • Configuration management server
  • Local area network
• Software Components:
  • Test Tools
  • Documentation Tools
  • Configuration Management Tools

Stakeholders

The typical stakeholders of the test environment are:

• Producers:
  • Environments Team
• Evaluator:
  • Environments Inspection Team
• Approvers:
  • Technical Leader
  • Project Manager
  • Customer Representative
• Maintainers:
  • Independent Test Team
  • Environments Team
• Users:
  • Independent Test Team, which uses the test environment to perform functional, performance, load, stress, robustness, configuration, contention, availability, and portability testing.
  • Security Team, which uses the test environment to perform initial security testing.
  • User Experience Team, which uses the test environment to perform system usability testing.

Phases

• Business Strategy: Not Applicable
• Business Optimization: Not Applicable
• Initiation: Optionally Started
• Construction: Completed
• Delivery: Maintained
• Usage: Maintained
• Retirement: Archived

Preconditions

The test environment can typically be started if the following preconditions hold:

• Software integration has started.
• The Environments Team is adequately staffed and trained.

Inputs

The typical inputs to the test environment include:

• Work Products:
  • Project Environments Description Document
• Stakeholders:
  • Independent Test Team, which uses the test environment to perform functional, performance, load, stress, robustness, configuration, contention, availability, and portability testing.
  • Security Team, which uses the test environment to perform initial security testing.
  • User Experience Team, which uses the test environment to perform system usability testing.
  • Test tool Vendor Representatives

Guidelines

• The test environment should include the same source control software as the integration environment.
• Multiple testing environments may exist to perform different types of testing, especially portability testing which is often subcontracted out to a company that specializes in it and therefore has numerous different client and server computers, operating systems, browsers, etc.
• The staging environment is often also used as the test environment for system usability testing.

Conventions

The test environment is typically constrained by the following conventions:

• Test Environment Inspection Checklist

Examples

• Functional Test Environment
• Stress and Load Test Environment
• Portability Test Environment
• User Test Environment