If you own a business you probably have tons of valuable information stored on your server. You also have your client’s information which is stored there as well and could be vulnerable to a cyber attack or breach.
Making sure your servers are secure both protects your company and your clients. Read on to learn about a comprehensive risk assessment and how to identify vulnerabilities via web applications.
What Is Web Application Testing?
Website or web testing happens when you check your website or web application for potential problems or bugs. You want to do this before your site goes live and can be accessed by the public.
When you perform a web application test you’ll be checking functionality, security, usability, compatibility and the performance of the application or your entire website.
While in the web application test stage you’ll also be checking access to regular and handicapped users and your site’s ability to handle its traffic.
Why Do I Need It?
If you don’t run the proper tests for your web application you can be seen as an amateur in your profession or business. If users try to peruse your site and find bugs or glitches they will quickly turn away.
Users are apt to turn away from functioning sites quickly and if they are confronted with some trouble or are denied access they’ll certainly leave in a hurry.
How Do I Perform Web Application Testing?
You perform web application testing in eight ways. You’ll test things like functionality, usability, and security. Read below to learn how does web application testing work? These tips will help you identify any vulnerabilities in your application.
Functionality
When testing your web application it’s best to start with the site’s functionality. Testing the functionality is done in several parts.
This is where you find out if your product is doing what it’s intended to do and performing as it should when you developed it. The testing points are:
Links
Test all of your links to make sure none are broken. Links such as mail-to links, anchor links, internal links, and outgoing links.
Forms
Make sure all of your forms are working correctly. Make sure the scripting checks are working. This refers to things like making sure users fill out all mandatory fields.
Also, check the default values to assure they are getting populated. The information within the forms needs to be submitted to the live database and or linked to a correct email address. These forms need to be formatted for the best readability.
Cookies
Cookies are little files that are used by sites that remember user information during their sessions. This allows them to not have to log back in every time they visit your site.
When you test cookies you make sure the testing cookies are cleared or deleted when they expire or the cache is cleared. Also, you need to test the “delete cookies” feature to see if user login data is needed when they come back to the site.
HTML and CSS
Testing HTML and CSS is very important. Doing this makes sure that search engines can find your site easily.
To test these features you need to make sure there are readable color schemes and check for any syntax errors. Also. make sure you are within the standard compliance code and it’s allowed within your site.
Workflow
Test your business workflow by making sure end to end workflow in working properly. Also, you need to test negative scenarios. Scenarios such as when a user tries to execute a wrong step. The correct message needs to appear to guide them in the right direction.
Usability
You should carry out a usability test either on your own or with a small group of colleagues or beta testers. This is integral for your web application testing.
Navigation
Testing the navigation capabilities of your site includes buttons, menus, and links to other pages. They should all be consistent on every page of your site and able to be found easily.
Content
When you test the content you want to make sure that it’s readable with no grammar or spelling errors. Images need to contain an “alt” text as well.
Interface
The three interface areas to test are web, application, and database server.
Web Server
Make sure the web server is able to handle every application request while not denying any service.
Application
With the application, you need to make sure any requests are being sent to the database and the client output is correct. If there are any errors it should only be seen on the back end and not by the customer.
Database Server
If a query is sent to the database it needs to give the correct result. If a connection between all three layers can’t be established, make sure the user can see the right message.
Test the Database
You need to thoroughly test your database. This step is very important and here’s how to do it.
Check for errors that might come up when you execute a query. Make sure the integrity of the data is maintained when you create, update or delete any information in the database.
Ensure that the data retrieved from your database shows up accurately in your application. Make sure the response time is adequate and if not tweak it as needed.
Compatibility
You need to perform web application testing to ensure compatibility. This will tell if your site displays across different kinds of devices.
Operating System
Text fields and buttons need to render properly in your operating system. Double-check to make sure your site works well with all operating systems. Systems such as Mac, Linux, and Windows. Also, check that several browsers work like Chrome, Safari, Explorer, and Firefox.
Browser
All browsers, AJAX and Javascript should be authenticating correctly. Your site displays differently with different browsers. Don’t forget to make sure your site works well with mobile browsers too.
Performance
Testing the performance end of this will make sure that your site can work under all loads. Performance testing happens by load testing your web app and monitoring its behavior.
Check the response times at different connection speeds. Also, you need to do a stress test and find the site breaking point. See how the site recovers from a crash as well. Use optimization techniques to reduce load time.
Security
Security and running a comprehensive risk assessment are a main priority these days and you need to test out your web applications’ security before going live. Some things to watch for are:
Make sure restricted files can’t be downloaded unless access is granted. There should be no unauthorized access allowed to secure pages. Also, make sure SSL certificates are used and clients are redirected to the appropriate SSL pages.
Make sure sessions are terminated automatically during a long amount of inactivity.
Crowd Testing
The final step of your online web application testing is to do a crowd test. This will ensure everything is running smoothly and you are ready to launch.
Select a large group of people to execute tests on your site. After, they’ve searched the site and tried to perform the necessary actions, get their feedback. This will help you find any last-minute glitches that need to be fixed.
Web Testing Tools
You’ll want to look through some of the best web testing tools and find one that best suits your needs. Some web testing tools you might like are:
TestLink
TestLink is an open-source tool that is extremely user-friendly and comes with several useful features and options. Features such as:
- Metrics Support
- Test Creation and Execution
- Charts Support
- Defect Recording
- User-Friendly UI
PractiTest
PractiTest is another simple web testing tool you can use. It has many features that allow you to seamlessly integrate manual testing with automatic testing. You can manually create tests based on sprints and cycles.
You can also reuse these tests for different products and releases. You can use this under many different kinds of integrations as well.
Zephyr
Zephyr is one of the most popular web testing tools out there. It has one-click integration over sever platforms, no annual commitment and it comes with cloud, server and data center deployment options too.
No Vulnerabilities
The fewer vulnerabilities your online web application has the better. What you really want is to completely eliminate all of them. These vulnerabilities can disrupt and even completely debilitate your business and online traffic.
Having the right knowledge and tools to identify these vulnerabilities will help your business reach higher goals. It will also save you time and money, not to mention make your customers happy.
Many companies have these vulnerabilities but aren’t aware of them. Then, when they do become aware of them they may not know the correct path to take for getting things fixed or secured.
A great way to stay on top of things is to have a web testing checklist on hand at all times. This way you’ll be able to quickly address any problematic issues and identify any web vulnerabilities with your website.
Check out some of our other articles for more helpful content.
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