Why Early Introduction of Functional Testing in SDLC is Wise?

Software testing is often considered to be the pillars of success for the developing software. Its role becomes evident since before the start of the development process (with the feasibility testing procedure) and continues till after the development process has ended. In this article we will discuss the role of early introduction of the functional testing in Software Development Life Cycle or SDLC and why it is wise to do so.

In most cases, it is seen that the software developing organizations do not start testing the software till after the software has been already coded and then transformed into an application. However, this process is risky and often ends up to be helpless and cost ineffective. In order to create a quality product with high security levels, the SDLC should be improved which can be done only with the help of the introduction of the functional testing of the software as early as possible in the SDLC.

Statistics show that most of the bugs that a software may encounter are detected by the testing procedure at an early stage of the SDLC. The bugs that are detected at a later stage are usually harder to resolve and causes many more complications, thus wasting more money and time. To prevent this loss, testing should be initiated as soon as possible in the SDLC phase.

Theoretically SDLC consists of four broad stages:

1.   The planning phase where the entire process and working principle are planned for the particular software and it is seen that the client requirements are met by the whole plan.

2.  Based on this planning procedure, the estimated completion time of the software is detected.

3.     Each of the planned steps depends on the success of the previous step. Completion of the previous step, initiates the next step.

4.      Actual testing of the software on completion of the software creation.

However, in reality, things do not work out as smoothly and the completion time is altered.

A flexible working time for the development of the software often yields a good quality product, but a rigid time period allows less time in the testing phase, ultimately resulting in poor software and customer dissatisfaction. This is one of the major reasons why it is considered wise to introduce functional testing in an early SDLC stage. It prevents the piling up of the test results for the end and provides ample time for the developers to fix all the bugs that could possibly make the software weak and cause problems with the functionality.

Another major advantage of introducing functionality testing at an early phase of SDLC is the fact that it saves up a lot on the monetary front as well as time of the organization. In the initial stage of the SDLC, the bugs that are developed are small and hence can be easily fixed with minimal tweaking and it leaves the major functionality of the software unaltered. However, with the advancement in the SDLC process, more functions are added to the system giving rise to more complicated bugs that become harder to fix and consume more time and money.

So now that you are aware of all the issues that the SDLC faces due to a delayed functionality testing, we hope you will be able to judge the benefits of early introduction of the same.