Top 7 reasons to Deploy Service Virtualization in a QA Environment   

Maintaining the quality standards of any software is imperative to make it flawless and popular. While developing the software, quality assurance is the key to achieving the desired quality and customer satisfaction.  

During the Quality Assurance Process of any application, service virtualization can be your guard against all odds. For example, when an application is under the development process, you wait for it to reach the market. However, this creates pressure on the developing teams. Service virtualization helps the teams to lower the stress and complete the process without delay.   

Service virtualization is a process that creates a virtual reality for the software testers without compromising on quality. It is the process of simulating the components of an application that are not yet cooked to be served in the market.

In simple terms, service virtualization lets you run tests early on the app’s components that are not accessible or configured for testing instead of depending on developers to share the code. 

Top 7 reasons to deploy service virtualization in a QA environment 

Many organizations do not deploy service virtualization, but experts who engage in integrating the same consider the process to be one of the best ways to save application testing time and release the product into the market at the earliest. Here are the seven reasons why you should deploy service virtualization in a QA environment:  

1. Lesser dependency by teams:   

In an agile methodology, the team of developers and testers are dependent on each other for work. For instance, while performing quality assurance, the team of software testers is dependent on developers for the code to perform tests.

However, when service virtualization is deployed in the QA environment, a virtual scenario is created where the application components are mocked, and the tests are performed. Thereby it reduces the dependency of the teams on each other and thus results in better quality. 

2. Quality checks at reduced costs:   

Utilizing surplus resources during the software development lifecycle extracts a considerable sum of money from the organization. These resources can include third-party API, longer duration of tests due to lack of strategic planning, or less use of tools. However, when service virtualization is adopted, the number of tests is reduced, and teams do not have to wait much longer to get the work done, which reduces the human resource cost to perform quality assurance.  

3. Less time for development and more time to market:   

To release the product early and have more time to market, you expect the teams to work faster and maintain the quality. Although this could be a challenge for the entire team, with service virtualization, teams have been able to fulfill the product owners’ requirements. In addition, with less dependency and simulating components with virtualization, it has allowed testers to complete the quality assurance process in lesser time.  

4. Top-notch quality:   

By working on real-time copies of application components, testers can perform multiple tests on the same. Furthermore, the process exposes them to all the faults and glitches that the application might face after its launch in the market. Thus, with multiple checks, the quality of the application is proven to be top-notch, with lesser hiccups.   

5. Continuous testing with delivery:  

With service virtualization being a part of the SDLC, the team performs and promotes continuous testing. Continuous testing helps the team perform different automated tests as part of the software delivery pipeline. The entire process showcases all the failure risks of the application and helps with accelerating the continuous delivery process. 

6. Promotes test automation:

To meet the quality standards of any complex application, it is necessary to perform various tests like load, stress, functionality, regression, or integration testing. And to carry out all these tests smoothly, Test Automation is imperative. Automating these tests with the deployment of service virtualization in the SDLC will help the team maintain quality right from the outset and resulting in flawless delivery.   

7. Reduces limitation in the test environment:   

A QA environment can have many hurdles in the entire team, from developers to testers. Adopting service virtualization in a QA environment will help the team overcome some of these limitations that can stop or delay the process. These hurdles could be due to lack of resources, unexpected requirements, changes, or maintenance of quality standards. Simulating the components without compromising quality could be one solution to many problems.   

In the end:   

With many challenges on the developers’ way, service virtualization is the solution to some of them. Deploying the same would do good, not just to the teams but also to the product owners. With SV, everything is possible, but to integrate the service virtualization testing smoothly in a QA environment, it’s the QA experts who can do justice, take all your concerns into their own hands, and deliver a qualitative application.