ATF and the Art of not boiling the ocean

[ChrisF323949498]

Automated Testing Framework

'ATF' is servicenow' native testing tool.

• Need to load a form and check a field is mandatory?
• Check a submission successfully writes to the database?
• Need test evidence and screenshots for your CAB submission?

It’s got you covered!

Plus its capabilities keep on being extended and in Yokohama we see the option of Reusable tests, categories etc.

But I have seen a reoccurring issue, either no tests or all the tests.

I think we’ve set the bar too high for ourselves, which is promoting dread of writing ‘all the tests’ and perhaps leading to procrastination… and no tests.

You don’t need to automate every test, do this:

1. Identify what is business critical e.g:
   1. Can the user submit an incident by completing the core fields your organisation cares about? Perfect, lets test just those fields for this 1 item.
      
      
   2. Are the most popular catalogue items still working?
      And yes, you can test catalogue items we even have test suites available to get you started 
      
      
2. Test ONLY those items first.

That’s it! Nothing more.

This does a few things:

1. It gets your team started in ATF, and once they’re comfortable, you’ll likely see them wanting to roll out tests as part of the builds. Why? Because comfort builds confidence, and fear tends to block us from doing things... and fear is often driven by lack of knowledge.
   
   
2. You won’t miss the obvious – We’ve all been there, we’ve got our fantastic script include running and cut down its run time, cleaned up the code…. But then we’ve forgotten to add a field to the form. D’oh.
   So this tests the most critical items, so you’re covered and don’t look, well, silly… 😄
   
   
3. It immediately adds value, and gives you a starting point to demo and justify why you may need extra time on future enhancements to management.

Once you start to get in the flow of things, then it’s time to iterate, consult your broader teams, make use of new features like ATF reusable steps, etc - but don't worry about that for now, remember, start small, but do start.

Testing can be seen as unglamourous, it doesn’t add cool features, it’s doesn’t give us something visible to ship. However testing is of huge importance, but don’t try to boil the ocean… just start with one tiny step.

Oh and have you ever heard ‘Since the upgrade things are slower’? Well, did you know you can do performance testing using ATF?

But that’s a topic for another day.

Now go and write your first test 😛