Appium Testing: Empowering Developer Velocity Through Mobile Automation

The Internet is one of the most important inventions that has brought the entire world a step closer and helped improve coordination in various segments of the industry. With devices such as Desktop, Mobile, and tablets, users would access desktop-like performance while using devices that can fit in their pockets. Thus, the smartphone industry started rising exponentially, and app developers could see a market in this segment. While developing smartphone applications, companies can use Appium for various test cases.

So, with the help of this article, we will try to elaborate on the concept of using Appium testing to empower development velocity through the help of detailed mobile automation testing.

The Mobile App Industry

To understand the current status of the mobile application industry, app developers must have clear concepts about the influence and diversity of this segment. To start things, we can analyze a survey that states that almost 55% of the current Internet traffic is dominated by mobile users. Currently, the three most popular mobile operating systems include Android, iOS, and Windows. To develop our idea about the diversity of the mobile industry, we can consider the fact that only in the Android segment more than a thousand new devices are launched annually. Moreover, all of these devices are unique in terms of hardware, display resolution, screen size, and many other parameters. So, while developing mobile applications, it is almost impossible to generalize the test cases.

With the integration of automation testing, app developers can massively boost the effectiveness of mobile test cases. This process includes the elimination of human involvement in test cases. Instead, the system will use a text file that will supply all the required parameters, data sets, and other characteristics for interacting with the application like a human user. Based on these interactions and emulations, the system will generate a detailed report showing the usability, effectiveness, and other parameters of the test cases. These reports will help the testers and developers to understand whether the application is fit to be released to real users. In this process, the app developers can also make significant changes to improve the customization and accuracy of the testing process.

While using test automation, there is also a possibility to store a huge segment of the existing automation test data for reusing in future app projects. However, test automation is an expensive process as it includes the integration of various tools, plugins, and libraries during the initial setup. Thus, app companies and developers must properly plan their investments.

Introducing Appium

We can introduce Appium as an open-source project and ecosystem consisting of related software. It was designed to facilitate the user interface automation of various mobile platforms like iOS, Android, and Windows. Using this tool, app developers can initiate automation testing of multiple applications like native apps, web apps, and hybrid apps. It also supports the use of mobile simulators and emulators as well as the integration of real mobile devices. Since Appium is open source, the application developers can access all of its features without worrying about any integration or license charges. All the test cases conducted by Appium are language-agnostic, and users do not have to install any add-on software on their mobile devices for using Appium.

Use of Appium for Empowering Developer Velocity Through Mobile Automation

To properly utilize the full potential of Appium, the application developers must have a detailed idea of all the features that are available with this tool. So, for the simplicity of the new developers and testers, we have listed down some of the most empowering features of Appium:

Cross-Platform Support: Appium provides cross-platform support when the application developers are working with mobile forms applications. developers are working with mobile applications. This means that the app developers can use the same platform for executing the test cases on iOS, Android, and Windows OS. The major benefit of this process is that it saves a lot of time that the application developers would have to invest in creating individual test cases depending on their target operating system. Moreover, the cross-platform support massively helps to improve the test coverage and thus increases the compatibility of the app.

Reusability of Test Code: Using the unified API of Appium, the application developers can write automation test cases in multiple programming languages like JavaScript, Python, Ruby, C#, and many others. With the help of this feature, the application developers can reuse the existing automation test code in future app development projects. Moreover, the unified API makes it very easy and efficient to maintain the automation libraries and frameworks.

Efficient Feedback Loop: Since automation testing is much more efficient compared to manual test cases, Appium helps the application developers to receive faster feedback about the execution and final result of the test cases. This method helps to ensure that the developers and testers can immediately implement the changes and remove the bugs and errors that have been detected in the system. The combination of all these processes helps to massively reduce the development cycle of the application.

Continuous Integration and Continuous Development: Continuous Integration and Continuous Development are two of the most important components of agile methodologies. With the help of Continuous Integration and Continuous Development, the application developers can run the development and testing processes side by side. This means that the window of error detection and error removal would be significantly lower compared to contemporary application development practices. With the help of this process, it is also possible to automatically trigger the automation testing process whenever the system detects any change in the code.

Parallel Test Execution: With the help of Appium, the application developers can execute parallel testing on mobile automation test cases. The major benefit of this process is that it enables the execution of multiple test cases on different testing configurations and machines at the same time. The concept of parallel testing works on the principle of a hub connected to several nodes. So, whenever the system receives a test case, it automatically redirects it to the target element of the application. Parallel testing is highly useful on modern apps that consist of thousands of different elements.

Improved test Coverage: The intelligent interface of Appium helps the app developers to ensure that they have dedicated test cases to verify the functioning of all the elements present in the mobile app. It also helps to improve the compatibility of the test cases on older interfaces, browsers, and systems. This is a very important parameter as it helps rapidly increase the target audience base. A survey also shows that more than 60% of the existing users have not updated their devices for three years.

Integration of real Device Testing: As we already mentioned earlier, it is almost impossible to generalize the automation test cases when the app developers are working with mobile devices. Moreover, the use of only emulators and simulators can never be completely accurate and dependable. So, while using Appium, the testers can use real device testing to understand the influence of various physical parameters like broken display, low bandwidth, or low battery on the functioning of the application. Moreover, with this tool, it is possible to integrate various cloud platforms that enable real device testing on the cloud. We will learn more about the influence of these platforms in the latter part of this article.

These were some of the most important parameters and features that are available with Appium testing. However, we would strongly recommend that the app developers and testers go through the detailed documentation that is available on the official website of Appium. This is because it will help them to understand some of the features that will be highly useful depending on their specific app development project. Finally, it is very important to ensure that the app developers are downloading all the Appium dependencies and plugins from the official website to avoid any privacy issues during the app development and testing process.

Use of Platforms and Tools with Appium Testing

Since the concept of mobile automation testing is relatively new to the industry, automation testers and developers can benefit a lot from the integration of various tools and platforms. For instance, with the help of cloud platforms, it is possible to eliminate the configuration of an on-site device test laboratory. This is because, with cloud platforms, it is possible to access real devices stored on remote servers through the Internet. Cloud platforms also have other benefits like the elimination of geolocation barriers and the integration of legacy devices. We can improve our knowledge about the influence of cloud-based solutions in the modern mobile automation segment with the help of LambdaTest as our benchmark:

For a general idea, we can say that LambdaTest is a modern automated cloud-based digital experience testing platform for web apps. With the help of this platform, app developers can import automation test cases from various well-known test suites and frameworks like Selenium, Playwright, and Cypress. For the Selenium test cases, it is possible to execute them on more than 3000+ environments including real device cloud. LambdaTest is also suitable for the verification of web pages that have local host servers. This platform uses advanced features like parallel test execution to improve the efficiency of the test cases multiple times.

Finally, the integration of hundreds of real devices with thousands of simulations and emulation software massively boosts the dependability of the test reports.

The Conclusion

The primary goal of this article was to justify Appium as one of the best mobile automation tools that help application developers to improve the efficiency and quality of the app undergoing the development process. We are slowly moving towards an app development market that will be completely dominated by advanced automation testing practices. So, it is very important for the developers and testers to not only incorporate these practices but also improve their understanding and knowledge regarding all the revolutionary trends in this segment. On the other hand, app companies can also help boost this transition with the help of multiple seminars and campaigns that can spread relevant information. Finally, it is very important to not only choose the correct automation tool but also to have a different idea about the requirements of the target audience.