Scope of Discussion

Introduction- Telecom, Testing Telecom Activities Why to Automate Telecom Process? Telecom Workflow Testing Overview Testing Team Testing Workflow Types of Testing Automated Testing Q & A - interactive

Telecom Activities
Pre Sales: Handles all the sales information like promos, discounts, services etc. Ordering: Applying for a new connection or changing / modifying/ disconnecting a connection is under this division. Provisioning: This division deals with the physical connection between customer and telecom service provider (TSP). Billing: All billing works is done under this division. Service Assurance: This division maintains the service of TSP. In case of any failure in the connection this division corrects the problem. Inventory Systems: This is the repository of all information. Tracking: This division tracks the ordering system and the status of an order. Each of these tasks can be treated as a Department.

Why to Automate Telecom Process?

Prior to automation, it took about 6 to 12 months for TSP to carry out all the activities with more or less 100 % manual involvement. That too with lots of erroneous outputs Then came small individual applications with its own conventions, which took about 3 months for the whole processes. Later on the applications were merged / reduced so that the automation was given more focus, the process duration is less than 3 weeks and with drastic reduction in errors.

The following 2 concepts were used for the same. Concepts of Zero: Reducing manual touch points and increasing automation in different divisions. Concepts of One: Consolidating all small related applications to a single application. Ex. User Login, Ordering.

Telecom Workflow
TSP approaches customers (marketing) Customer generates enquiry (quotation) Customer orders a service to TSP Then after provisioning (technical evaluation), implementation of order takes place. Here tracking system tracks the order status, if the order implementation stops at any stage, tracks and tries to fix it. After the implementation is over and the client starts using the service, the billing starts. Now to support the customer service, Service Assurance team works. Software will have applications to support each of these

Testing Overview
Telecom being a vast domain, will have many software systems to automate the same & Testing is an integrated Part of successful software development. 20 to 30 % of the project effort can go into testing related activities. Test effort is estimated (History data helps) Focus on White and Black box testing. Do Manual and Automated testing based on the needs Follow a documented testing process Supports enhancements (including migration) and production issues

Team
Form a team with mix of experience (domain, testing, interest, language) Members are inducted to applications and trained Test Engineers should be allotted to projects from the beginning based on their experience so that they have good control over the testing. Should have good clarity about the requirements Should be focused on finding faults in system flow. To be specific, think yourself as a customer and simulate his approach. Ensure growth and value to company and self Concept of independent test team

Testing Workflow
Project Starts Tester Assigned Requirements Shared Execute Test Raise Defects Plan Test Prepare Test
Consider the following 1. Dependency 2. Risks 3. Impact of change 4. Schedule issues 5. Resource issues 6. Tools availability

Check defects

Complete

Types of Testing
Based on projects needs, we can do almost all types of testing. Few of them are ST, IST / IPWT / SIT, Test Only, Test Support Only, Table Update, performance, volume etc. Have separate ST environments May support customer driven tests also.

Automated testing
We are having initiatives to use Rational Robot to do functional, UI, regression testing & load and performance testing. Uses DRTT for defect tracking. Uses RMT and TMT for requirement and test management. RPM is used for project tracking Few project uses Win runner, Load runner & Test Director also

Process Followed
In AT&T account we are following Express one process.
E1 Test Level Unit Test Integration Test System Test

Pre-Production Test (IST, IPWT, UAT)

Post-Production Test (ORT, UCT, NVT, EVT,NMVT)
Post-Production Tests: Pre-Production Tests: IST=Intersystem Test IPWT=Integrated Pairwise Test UAT=User Acceptance Test UCT=User Certification Test ORT=Operational Readiness Test EFVT=Equipment Field Verification Test NVT=Network Verification Test NMVT=Network Management Verification Test

RPM (Rational Portfolio Manager)

TMT (Test Management Tool)

DRTT (Defect Recording & Tracking Tool)

Q&A
Questions Please.