Script-less Automated End-to-End Testing is Silly, Doomed to Fail!

If the test scripts are not plain-text in a scripting language, avoid it.

Zhimin Zhan

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Over the years, I have witnessed many attempts to test automation using Scriptless, Codeless, or No-Code approaches.

  • Recorder-Generated
    Commonly found in old-generation test automation tools, such as Rational Functional Tester.
  • So-called Codeless Test Automation
    Typically, allow users to drag and Drop based on Object-Identification to generate test scripts.
  • AI Testing
    This is the hype of the moment, such as ChatGPT. Generating automated test scripts based on user requests.
Source: LinkedIn

Of course, all these attempts failed. The reason, it violates the fundamentals of Test Automation. I will illustrate with web test automation, the most popular type of testing. The same principles applied to Desktop and Mobile test automation.

Table of contents:
1. No matter what, it is the test scripts that drive the automation.
2. All software contains bugs, including the test automation software, of course
3. Test Creation is only ~10%

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Zhimin Zhan

Test automation & CT coach, author, speaker and award-winning software developer. Help teams succeed with Agile/DevOps by implementing real Continuous Testing.