17 Nov
IOT Application Testing
The Internet of Things is on its way to become the biggest software development and testing opportunity of all time. IoT brings many new things to the table in terms of testing requirements , including quite a few unusual device types like home appliances, watch sensors etc. With such an eclectic mix of products in the IoT ecosystem, it becomes imperative for the QA team to come with an effective test strategy to meet the quality of these diverse products.
An IoT setup uses various software testing approaches from our regular QA practices to validate the IoT applications. It is important to give equal emphasis on all the three IoT core components viz Devices, Communication between the devices and computing the amount of data that needs to be processed and analyzed.
Performance testing:
This covers the rapidity of the communication network model, as well as the internal computation capabilities of the embedded software system.Performance Testing in IoT needs to be done at Network and Gateway level (protocols like MQTT, CoAP, HTTP etc), System Level(Database, processing, analytics), and the Application Level.
Security Testing:
This includes security aspects like data protection, device identity authentication, encryption/decryption, etc. Security Testing in an IoT framework includes both securing the devices themselves and the networks or cloud services they are connected to.Sensor networks, real-time data collection applications, middleware, interfaces and M2M protocols are just a few variables that could bring in more injectable points and new security threats. Security test at the device and protocol level is one of the important areas where issues can be detected at the source.
End-user application Testing:
Includes the testing of all functional use cases of an IoT application which also includes user experience and usability testing.
Device Interoperability Testing:
This involves assessing the ability to seamlessly interoperate protocols and devices across different standards and specifications. In a nutshell, it verifies the connectivity across all the devices and protocols in the IoT set up. Interoperability Testing in the Service Layer of the IoT framework becomes very crucial as IoT requires standards to enable platforms that are communicable, operable, and programmable across devices, regardless of make, model, manufacturer, or industry.
