The "A" Word. Under the Covers of Test Automation

It’s hard to write sustainable and reliable tests, and it’s hard to write trustworthy tests. Double the effort required if those tests involve UI automation. Designing good tests is one of the hardest tasks in software development.

If you’re a tester who writes code, you’re not a test automator, you’re not a test automation engineer, and you don’t write test automation or test code.

You write code. And you test.

I am not completely against GUI automation, but I do think that it’s easy (too easy) to get wrong, and that it’s overrated and undervalued among may testers. The best part about my opinion is that if you disagree with me, you have to write good GUI automation.

I think it’s critical to use whatever means you have to learn about the customer, or to understand the customer, but you will never be the customer. Regardless of the skills you do (or don’t) have.

I find it a bit silly to think that just because someone knows how to program, that they are somehow “tainted”, and will be unable to look at a program from the proper “tester angle” because they have a notion of how the stuff under the hood actually works.

I, for one, have never bought into the "automation as a time saver", or "automation to replace manual testing" thoughts I hear from time to time.