Testing teams have had to reevaluate their testing methods over the past few years. Organizations are moving toward remote working methodologies with uncertainty looming over resuming in-person work. However, with a remote work environment comes the challenge of testing and maintaining physical devices. Organizations now distribute development teams globally, adding to the challenge, as these teams need access to the same testing devices to ensure uniform and shareable test results.

1. How to Test Your Mobile Apps From
Anywhere
Testing teams have had to reevaluate their testing methods over the past few
years. Organizations are moving toward remote working methodologies with
uncertainty looming over resuming in-person work.
However, with a remote work environment comes the challenge of testing and
maintaining physical devices. Organizations now distribute development
teams globally, adding to the challenge, as these teams need access to the
same testing devices to ensure uniform and shareable test results.
A cloud-based testing platform with a global device cloud can help you meet
these testing needs.
Why is Cloud Testing needed?

2. There are many reasons why cloud testing is in popular demand. A report
from Statista highlights that by 2025, the Cloud applications market size will
reach 168.6 billion USD. With so many organizations lining up for cloud
testing, what makes it so desirable? Here are a few reasons why:
1.​ Heavy applications usually take a long time to test. With cloud testing,
organizations see a massive reduction in this time. Its flexibility,
scalability, and the reduced resources consumed help significantly
improve ROI.
2.​ With cloud testing, customers pay only for the resources they use,
making it cost-effective. Additionally, remote teams from all over the
world can use cloud testing.
3.​ Cloud testing comes with high scaling capabilities. Organizations can
either scale up or down based on their requirements and be sure that
their cloud-testing platform will scale with them. Cloud testing makes
things much simpler where traditional methods may crash or leave a
dent in your pockets.
4.​ Due to its availability, cloud testing ensures that physical restrictions
do not interfere with your testing procedures. Typically, cloud-based
testing platforms come with tools that help facilitate collaboration,
enabling teams to collaborate in real-time and work on testing.
5.​ Since cloud testing processes are faster than traditional ones,
organizations see an increase in their time-to-market.
6.​ Cloud testing comes with a more straightforward disaster recovery
procedure.

3. Points to Remember Before Cloud
Testing
1.​ Security issues around data privacy are a significant concern in the
Cloud. Since security is hard to maintain in a shared environment,
precautions are a must.
2.​ Multi-cloud models are another area where complications can arise.
Since these models can contain private, public, and hybrid clouds,
organizations can experience synchronization and security issues.
3.​ Discrepancies in the network, storage, and server configurations can
affect cloud operations. Since it is a challenge to replicate user
ecosystems, these discrepancies are difficult to avoid.
4.​ Shared resources can lead to bandwidth issues. Handling heavy traffic
with limited infrastructure is a real challenge.
Cloud Testing Types
Testers can use traditional and new-age methods to run tests in the Cloud.
Here are a few types of cloud tests and why testers use them:
Testing the Whole Cloud
Testing the whole Cloud involves viewing the Cloud as an entity and observing
its features. Testers write tests according to these aspects.
Testing Elements Within the Cloud

4. Testing elements within the Cloud involves assessing the Cloud's internal
features and carrying out tests accordingly.
Testing Across Clouds
Testing across clouds involves testing on public, hybrid, and public clouds,
depending on specifications.
SaaS Testing the Cloud
Software as a Service testing the Cloud involves running functional and
non-functional tests based on requirements.
Testers also perform cloud testing in 3 types of environments. They are:
1.​ A public or private environment where apps deployed in the Cloud
need validation regarding their quality.
2.​ A hybrid environment where deployed apps need validation regarding
their quality.
3.​ And finally, a cloud-based test environment where deployed apps need
validation regarding their quality.
Functional Testing
Functional testing ensures that the software functions and features work
according to the requirements set by the client. It also ensures that the
software interacts well with the hardware. Functional testing includes system
testing, acceptance testing, and integration testing. Some basic functional
tests include:

5. System Verification Testing
System verification testing helps testers identify if a function's modules
perform how they are supposed to - which is the main aim of this test.
Acceptance Testing
Acceptance testing involves allowing the users to use the cloud-based app to
ensure it meets the specified requirements.
Interoperability Testing
Interoperability testing ensures that Cloud-based applications work on
multiple platforms without issues and move seamlessly around cloud
infrastructures.
Non-Functional Testing
Developers use non-functional testing to check their app's performance,
usability, and reliability. This type of cloud testing may include:
Performance Testing
Testers focus on verifying response times and network latency in
performance testing to ensure the app performs well despite multiple
requests. They also check the app's ability to decommission resources
depending on the user load.
Security Testing

6. Security testing ensures the protection of all sensitive information available
on the Cloud.
Multi-tenancy Testing
Multi-tenancy testing checks if the app gives access and security to data to
multiple users using a single instance.
Availability Testing
Ability testing involves checking for operability, compatibility, multi-tenancy,
and disaster recovery.
Effective Ways of Testing Cloud
Applications
Online-Based Application Tests on a Cloud
These tests determine and validate the quality of the connection between a
legacy system and the application. Tests do this through functional tests to
check their Cloud-based services' functionality and performance.
Cloud-Based Application Tests on a Cloud
Cloud-based application tests help evaluate the quality of cloud-based
applications concerning various types of Cloud.
Cloud Oriented or SaaS Testing

7. This test aims to assess the quality of individual service functions offered in
Cloud or Saas programs. These tests validate unit, security, functionality,
integration, and system functions. Performance testing, regression testing,
and scalability evaluation are the best ways of running Cloud orientation or
Saas testing.
How to prepare for cloud-based testing
1. Set clear objectives
Define why you need cloud-based testing software and what you expect from
it before you can use it. Many organizations use these technologies because
they're accessible and popular. Understanding your business needs is the only
way to benefit from a cloud-based testing platform. When you have clear
objectives while testing your app, cloud testing will help you get the most out
of it.
2. Create your testing strategy
Develop a testing strategy before you move your project to the Cloud. This
strategy must have a step-by-step plan on how you intend to achieve your
testing goals - What processes will you have in place? What tools will you use?
What type of tests do you want to run?
Have a proper idea of what tests you want to run, the risks involved, and the
time they'll take. Developing a strategy will help you to get a better idea of your
budget and avoid unnecessary costs.

8. 3. Plan your infrastructure
Consider the infrastructure requirements to build a test environment while
planning your testing strategy. Make sure that cloud-based services provide
the necessary testing tools, software, hardware, and bandwidth. It's also
essential to determine if you'll need to make changes to your testing
environment and the time you'll take to test the environment in this
configuration.
4. Select a reliable provider
When looking for cloud-based testing tools, look at each provider's guarantee
of security, quality, and reliability. Choosing a provider with considerable
experience ensures quick set-up and tear-down of test environments is best.
The selected provider should have various services, including testing tools,
licenses, complete provisioning, and physical infrastructure. Also, examine a
provider's compliance certificates to ensure the provider will protect your
sensitive data according to local laws.
How HeadSpin Helps
The HeadSpin Platform gives you the ability to perform real device testing.
You can connect to real devices across the globe and evaluate actual user
experience without compromising security and performance. Here's how the
platform can help:
1. HeadSpin enables customers to deliver flawless connected experiences
across all connected devices, applications, and networks. The HeadSpin

9. Appliance is built on top of the global device cloud and supports on-premise
deployments or deployments on the Cloud.
2. Through HeadSpin, you can collect data from real devices. The data
platform analyses this using machine learning models, enriching the insights
we receive from raw data; this includes issue detection.
3. HeadSpin uses the Waterfall UI as its primary session UI. After recording
your sessions, you can see all the collected data streams as part of the
capture session here, including the primary data streams, for example, the
screen recording, network traffic (HTTP and binary), and the device logs. Here
you will also find issue cards.
4. The system populates issue cards in rank order using the Impact Time
metric. Issue cards help customers trying to dig into a Root Cause Analysis
through a systematic alignment of all the data streams. The issues start from
high-priority user-facing problems and go down into the root causes.
5. HeadSpin offers two types of deployments - Hybrid On-Premise, and Fully
On-Premise
Hybrid On-Premise: HeadSpin offers a hybrid on-premise deployment with a
Virtual Private Cloud (VPC). Through the VPC, we generate a separate
instance in AWS for customers, allowing them to have their silo and ensure
security. We also host their unified controller and store their data while
customers use the HeadSpin appliance.
Customers can also collocate hardware like having a HeadSpin Appliance in
their offices and one at a HeadSpin data center.

10. Fully On-Premise: With the fully on-premise deployment, the customer gets to
host all their hardware and data. They can host their unified controller in a
bare metal server that HeadSpin provides or a virtualized server that the
customer provides based on HeadSpin specifications; this lets our customers
be fully air-gapped.
6. The Create Your Own Lab (CYOL) product from HeadSpin allows companies
to remotely test and debug key workflows for their apps. With HeadSpin's
reverse bridge technology, CYOL can deliver local access to remote devices
for manual and automated testing. You can track device usage and identify
who had access to it last, and with the Cloud, you have access to a variety of
iOS and Android devices to meet all your testing needs.
Conclusion
Mobile cloud testing will continue to grow, and the need for a robust platform
to help with this will also increase. Going about real device cloud testing is a
challenge. HeadSpin offers a comprehensive solution that you can use to
meet all your testing needs.
This article was originally published on:
https://www.headspin.io/blog/how-to-test-your-mobile-apps-from-anywhere