Is T-Plan Robot Enterprise a Good Choice for Me?

The most important factor to realize is that since the tool is able to test anything on the graphical desktop, it should therefore be the first choice for any Black Box GUI Testing. Whether you are testing a GUI application, web application, mobile application, or a system component etc. the tool will out perform expectations across all major platforms and environments with ease. Our tool tests as a user would control or operate the system, application or device; in a non-intrusive way.

Object Orientated Test Tools are focused towards one particular technology... Robot on the other hand is a true cross-device and cross-platform software testing tool, utilising human like automation to drastically reduce the testing effort. In an age where cost reduction and ROI is paramount, investment in a tool that can do it all is very attractive.

Please see below our Top 10 reasons why you would purchase from T-Plan:

1) TEST ANYTHING, ANYWHERE…

• Platform independence via Java. Robot runs on, and automates all major systems, such Windows, Mac, Linux, Unix, Solaris, Mobile etc.
• Mobile platform support for Android, iPhone, Windows CE, Blackberry and Symbian.
  • Robot is the only mobile test automation solution that allows full control of iOS and Android devices for mobile application testing; without the need for jail-breaking (rooting).
  • Non-Jailbroken (non-rooted) Apple iOS devices can be automated using our T-Plan Server tool with the iOS Mirror connection.
• Test ANY system. As automation runs at the GUI level, via the use of VNCVirtual Network Computing (VNC) is a graphical desktop sharing system that uses the RFB protocol to remotely control another computer. VNC is platform-independent. Multiple clients may connect to a VNC server at the same time., the tool can automate most applications. E.g. Java, C++/C#, .NET, HTMLHypertext Markup Language. A set of tags used to mark the structural elements of text files. HTML files include tags that create hyperlinks to other documents on the Internet. (web/browser), mobile, command line interfaces; also, applications usually considered impossible to automate like Flash/Flex, HTML5 etc.
• Robot is environment agnostic - i.e. it can run on any platform... the same version... the same scripts... everything the same (licenses / look and feel etc.)! It can be used to test almost any application or device... mobile / legacy / point of sale (cash machines etc.) / radar / GIS mapping etc.
• As we only have one version of the tool supporting Windows, Mac, Linux etc. we do not charge different prices (like our competitors) for the tool running in the different environments.

2) Non-Intrusive.

• Robot does not require any modification to the system or application under test.
• Test as a user would control or operate the system, application or device. Utilise human like automation to drastically reduce the effort of cross-device and cross-platform software testing.
• No application authoring to include test tool hooks etc. I.e. NO Source Instrumentation (compile-time) code required. Allows your ‘vanilla’ application to be received (from the developers or third party) / downloaded (from the market or test portal etc.) / installed (like it would be in a production environment) and tested.
  • I.e. True production environment readiness can be achieved, as no foreign code has been included into the application for testing.

3)  Ease of Use, Resourcing & Skill Transfer.

• Incredibly easy to use, as you are essentially testing how a user would test, by looking at the screen, using visual image recognition. This technology coupled with Record & Replay capabilities make the product very intuitive and very quick to learn.
• As Robot fully supports Java as a programming language, I guarantee that you will find more people skilled in Java, than any proprietary scripting language supported by other vendors.
  • Makes resourcing easier and more expandable across multiple locations, and off shoring of resource also, should this be a consideration.

4) Full support of Java.

• Use the worlds most used programming language to write and execute scripts. Support of Java test scripts as well as a proprietary scripting language.
• Java code can be compiled and executed on the fly.
• Use of Java IDE e.g. Netbeans or Eclipse is supported.
• Java Test Script Converter allows conversion of Robot scripts into Java.

5) Open architecture.

• Extension plugin interface allows easy customization and integration with other tools. E.g. with a relational DB via JDBC.
• XML / xslt stylesheet reporting that can be utilised into other tools.
• Full Java APIApplication Programming Interface allows integration and interaction with many different toolsets.
• Provided integrations include MS Excel, Tesseract (Google) OCR or ABBY OCR, and Sikuli etc.
• Test many languages including Chinese, Japanese and Russian with OCR (Optical Character Recognition).
• Integration with T-Plan's own Test Management (Reporting etc.) and Defect Management products, namely T-Plan Professional and T-Plan Incident Manager.

6) Extensible image comparison and search options.

• Powerful multiple image search allows changing of window layout, button position etc. E.g. Radar object detection, GIS map testing etc.
• Object search & background detection to detect objects by color, by color range, and on different backgrounds.
• Uniquely supplement with java add-ins for e.g. colour matching with image comparison.
• Static Image Testing – create tests offline from image repositories..
• Supports testing on Single Desktop, ADB (Android), and over the RFB protocol (better known as VNC).

7) Unattended Batch Execution - CLI (Command Line Execution).

• Automatic execution of scripts are supported using the incredibly powerful CLICommand Line Interface.
• Allows Robot to become part of an automation framework alongside e.g. HP Quality Center, and other out-of-house / in-house test tools.

8) License flexibility.

• T-Plan charges for each simultaneous connection to the system under test. Effectively this is a per user license.
• NO differences based on node locking or floating.
• NO different prices for different installations per environment (Windows version or Mac/Linux version).
• Online Update & Upgrade functionality.

9) Competitive Pricing.

• We operate a purchase (perpetual) and yearly (annual subscription membership). If you want… You buy you keep!
• Our support charge covers for all major and minor upgrades.
• Our competitors charge for major upgrades.

10) Excellent support.

• Customer focused company with development focus to provide customers with functionality they desire.
• UK based for flexible time zone support etc.
• Honest and open staff with no intensive sales force and pressure selling techniques.

Making the Difference!

1) Where is Robot placed?

Our product "T-Plan Robot Enterprise" is a Test Automation software tool. In industries such as gaming and mobile app development, speed of delivery is of the utmost importance. One of the biggest challenges to any auditable verification process is time. When squeezed for time due to delivery timescales, the testing or the software is normally the first to suffer. Test Automation in this instance can really help in reducing the business risks of releasing a product, that has not had time to go through the proper battery of tests. How... by getting computers to do the job of 'regression testing' whilst the workers are asleep, or by freeing up your workers so that they can concentrate on critical areas of the system that have just been produced. The justifications for automation are well documented on the web...so... what are you waiting for?

2) How does our tool work?

By creating a series of scripts or actions, T-Plan Robot can exercise or drive applications in the same way as would an end user. In essence, imagine yourself sitting at your PC and running through a list of 'pre-flight' checks on the software, and recording these. Now imagine the PC, using our Robot software, playing this list back to you over and over again, perhaps under different circumstances etc. and then telling you the results when it was finished. For example... you want to conduct the same list of checks simultaneously on a Windows PC / Windows Tablet / Mac / iPad / Linux PC (Ubuntu etc.) etc. to check that the software works in all of these environments. Welcome to the world of test automation...

3) How are we different?

The key to answering this is in the first sentence of point number 3) : "The same way as would an end user". Robot is an "image based" test automation tool and approaches validation from the end-user perspective, providing critical validation that what you want the customer to see, they will actually get. We do this by capturing images and checking these images have remain unchanged during the test execution etc. I.e. just like a human would do by comparing 2 photos... or 2 pictures from memory... but doing it programmatically, and therefore eliminating human error and saving time and therefore money! The fact is that if you are not using Robot you may be testing your code and qualifying that it does not have any bugs that a computer can detect, but a computer isn't a person. A person doesn't read code when they are using an application they work with, or a game. Therefore, without testing your software's interface (GUI) by "seeing it" or "reading it", can you really confidently say that you know your application will deliver the desired experience to the end user. Robot is also platform independent (Java) [environment agnostic] and runs on and automates all major systems such as Windows, Linux and Unix plus certain mobile platforms. The product has the same functionality, look and feel regardless of Operating System (OS). There is no need to relearn the product on various platforms, and your test scripts are completely transferable between platforms. This is a huge point for the gaming industry as many games now have to sit with no alteration of functionality in many different environments, mobile included. Our solution is a one size fits all approach!

4) Time for a change!

Yes IBM / HP etc. provide testing tools... but their approach is very developer centric. The 'big boys' all approach test automation with very complicated "object oriented" test tools. These tools require a development knowledge of the system under test (SUTSystem under test (SUT) refers to a system that is being tested for correct operation.) and a technical checking of the code behind the displayed result. In gaming the visual result is all important, and this in many circumstances cannot be verified at the component / object / code level. For example the work we have done with Zynga and Disney are classic examples of this where flash / flex / Silverlight etc. just cannot be easily tested using the 'old' tools provided by IBM and HP etc.

• Please view our YouTube Channel.

5) Resourcing and skill transfer.

As Robot fully supports Java as a programming language, I guarantee that you will find more people skilled in Java, than any proprietary scripting language supported by other vendors. This makes your resourcing easier and more expandable across multiple locations, and off shoring of resource also should this be a consideration.

This is written up in the blog post: Try something different for Test Automation!

Also see our blog post on how our tool can benefit your mobile testing effort: Is the World of Mobile Testing Round?

Do you need to answer these Questions?

• Testing of a mixture of technologies. Do you need to test CLI, GUI and/or a web interface in one go? Does your application contain a technology or a feature which is not supported by other test tools? T-Plan Robot Enterprise will help!
  
• Testing on less common platforms. Is your system under test running Solaris, Linux, HP-UX or any other less frequent desktop OS? We support it as long as there's a VNC server for that platform.
• Cross-platform testing. Do you need to connect to and automate on different platforms inside a single script? Would you like to design test scripts which would run across different systems? T-Plan Robot can do it all! An individual component can be represented by an image collection rather than one single image and platform-dependent pieces of code (routines) may be implemented through libraries separately from the main test script.
• Testing with images involved. Does your application display images or objects which are not recognized by the GUI component hierarchy in object oriented tools? Remember it's not a problem for T-Plan Robot.
• Non-invasive testing is required. There are projects which require no installation of third party components on the tested system to eliminate any environment risks. As remote desktop technologies are in many cases supported natively by the OS, T-Plan Robot Enterprise is a very good candidate. For example, on Linux you may enable VNC access to your default OS desktop. Mac OS on the other hand provides connection through ARD (Apple Remote Desktop) which is compatible with VNC. 
  

T-Plan Robot Enterprise is also suitable where:

• Fast automation is needed (shorter test cycle). As you don't have to deal with the underlying technology and the application GUI structure, creation of automated test scripts is generally simpler and faster than with object oriented tools.
• There's a lack of skilled QA staff. As the tool is easy lo learn and understand, it may be operated by a person with very limited programming background.
  
• Extensive verification means are not required. A good example is localization (l10n) testing where the typical goal is to execute one or more test scripts against a single program and multiple language packs in order to produce a set of screen shots of the localized product. These may be later on sent to language experts to verify the translation quality. In such a case one doesn't really need the GUI component hierarchy to be involved.