The IOT! Well known terminology in the recent days! If you
have not heard of it, let me tell you first of all-What is IOT? “Internet of Things refers to the concept
that the Internet is no longer just a global network for people to communicate
with one another using computers, but it is also a platform for devices to
communicate electronically with the world around them.” On the whole, the
Internet of Things is the future of technology that can make our lives easier
and efficient.
All kinds of ordinary household gadgets can be modified to
work in an IoT system. Wi-Fi network
adapters, motion sensors, cameras, microphones and other instrumentation can be
embedded in these devices to enable them to work in the Internet of Things. Coming
to the question, How IOT works? Internet
of Things is not the result of a single novel technology; instead, several
complementary technical developments provides capabilities that taken together
help to bridge the gap between the virtual and physical world.
All IOT devices will be embedded with sensors, RFID
technology, barcodes, QRcodes, NFC and they will sniff a wide variety of
information. Next comes the gateway, as the name itself says these are the
gateways to the internet for all the things/devices that we want to interact
with. Gateways helps to bridge the internal network of sensor nodes with the
external Internet or World Wide Web. They do this by collecting the data from
sensor nodes & transmitting it to the internet infrastructure. The data
transmitted through the gateway are stored & processed securely within the
cloud infrastructure using Big Data analytics engine. This processed data are
then used to perform intelligent actions that make all our devices Smart
Devices. Mobile apps will help end users to control & monitor their devices
from remote locations. These apps push the important information on your handheld
devices & help to send commands to your Smart Devices!
How does IOT Impact
on testing?
So what impact will the Internet of Things have on software
testing? What will change? As sensors increasingly connect physical hardware
with applications, old testing approaches must be revisited. The Internet of
Things is about reporting data in real time, allowing users to make quicker,
more informed decisions. It’s difficult to recreate the real life scenarios
while doing IOT testing.
Core components of IoT include three different components:
things, communication and computing. It is important to focus on all three core
components of the IoT system to ensure that the scalability, performance and
security of IOT devices up to the mark, the following types of tests are
recommended:
·
Interoperability testing : IOT interoperability
testing involves assessing the ability to seamlessly interoperate protocols
and devices across different standards
and specifications
·
Security and privacy testing: This includes
security aspects like data protection, device identity authentication,
encryption/decryption and trust in cloud computing.
·
Performance testing : This covers the rapidity
of the communication network model, as well as the internal computation
capabilities of the embedded software system
·
Compatibility testing: This includes all the
possible combination of device version, protocol version, mobile devices and
mobile OS version.
·
Exploratory testing: To test from the user’s
perspective and beyond predefined test procedures
·
End users application testing : This
includes the testing of all functional
and non-functional use cases of an IOT application, which also includes user
experience and usability testing
Let us take an example of Smart
watch and will see how testing can be done on smart watch!
Smart watches do more - a lot more than old analog watches. Smart
watches are designed to connect other devices like smartphones and users can
get message notifications, call notifications, GPS navigation and calendar
synchronization on their smart watches and it will run apps and play back all
sorts of digital media like audio tracks, Bluetooth headphones. Also these
smart watches specially designed for activity tracking purpose letting users to
know their steps and distance travelled, calories burned, monitoring heart rate
and tracking sleep quality.
For testing a smart watch all you need is one smart watch and app which
connects to smart watch. Testers tests the smart watch thoroughly covering all
functionalities like receiving notifications, sending text messages, audio
controlling of smartphone, checking GPS navigation and calendar synchs and also
testing activity graphs and analytics by connecting smart watch with the app.
Why is IOT Testing
important?
With Internet of Things (IoT) coming into prevalence the
world is becoming increasingly connected and companies providing IoT testing
services are emerging. From security systems, appliances, other emerging
connected devices to the mobile apps are moving beyond computers, tablets and
smartphones to just about every connected device we can imagine.
Users don’t care why IOT product has
failed in the connected chain and with time users will become more accustomed
to connected devices and the Internet of Things (IoT), they’ll expect the new
technologies to work flawlessly, hence it cannot be overlooked or ignored. IOT technology
must be tested to ensure its consistency and robustness. Reliability of IOT
ecosystems must be confirmed through rigorous testing. Solid security
technology must be installed in every tool right from the first design stage,
covering both hardware and the inbuilt software. Testing IoT before launch can
help error detection and avoid failure of IoT products. IoT products testing
will be the game changer.
- IoT generates huge amounts of data. Capturing, Routing, Analyzing, and using the insights of IoT data in timely and relevant ways is a real challenge with traditional frameworks.
- Privacy and security testing are major concerns in using IoT, because most of the devices have minimal human interference, so there is a potential risk of security breaches or malfunctioning devices that may cause catastrophic failures in the IoT ecosystem.
- Continuous testing of devices is required to avoid security breaches and guard the systems from major damage from attacks.
Life is simplifying with IOT devices!!
