Estimating an Automation Implementation

Estimating an Automation Implementation is a task which needs thorough Analysis, Efforts & Team work. After completing the Importance of Feasibility Study & Returns on Investments the next step surely be to estimate the efforts for whole project to be taken on. Whole below study totally just derives from experience and various learning’s.

Highlights (what all already covered in Feasibility & ROI study article): –

• Current state of task or Objective
• Feasibility, How much is feasible and How
• Benefits of documentation, Hard copy of all the needs
• POC through small scripts, Critical & Complex scenarios already have work around or solutions
• Technology needs, What we are using ahead JAVA, QTP, SELENIUM, etc
• Manual intervention, where all Manual Intervention is required
• Workflow, How automation will work and Application work flow through automation
• Maintenance & Risk, What can be the Risk and Mitigations for the same
• Quality & Reporting, Client Deliverables state is ready

Now, at last, we can say that we have everything in hand and if we have the project to implement further then surely, we need the total efforts to be spent on the same means “ESTIMATION”. Let’s Estimate them now in order to be able to plan the activity further

• Estimations: – One of the most integral part for any of the project and as we already discussed this point in our Feasibility study article that Automation cannot be a subpart of any project, if we really desire to have good ROI’s from Automation then we need to take care of Estimations also.

For estimating the same what all important points to be taken care are listed below: –

As per the Work break down structure, there can be two parts for any Automation to be estimated, first one the core framework or supporting framework which will be the main engine for executing the test scenarios & second part is actual Business and Test Scenario’s to be automated which includes Recoveries, Synchronizations, Object Repository, Test Inputs & Reports as well as Manual Intervention which we discussed in Feasibility Study.

 

Now, we can analyze and estimate our actual efforts to implement the core objective of the Automation as per the requirements, which we have already divided into two parts as per Page Object Model which is Business and Automation Scripts.

This estimation can be done with two approaches one through “Requirements” to be automated and the Second can be directly from the Application interface. I prefer to use application interface/pages, if available to analyze. How, through traversing Application Pages one by one as per the application flow and can say those below points are the specific columns in Excel.

• First, Analyze Page –> Page Name
• Second, On-Page sections to be automated –> Section Name
• Third, Section functionality –> Functionality
• Fourth, operation to be performed on Page –> Operation
• Fifth, Requirements which are covering through –> Requirement Covered
• Sixth, Per Operation Estimation –> Effort
• Seventh, Total effort –> Total
• Eighth, Number of Locators on section or on-page –> Locators
• Ninth, Estimation for finding the correct address of the locator on the page –> Locators Est
• Tenth, Total effort on that point for locators –> Total Locators Estimate
• Eleventh, Identification of recovery scenario if any on that operation –> Recovery Scenario
• Twelfth, Identification of Synchronization point if any on that operation –> Synchronization
• Thirteenth, Identification of checkpoint on that operation if any as per the requirement –> Checkpoint
• Like this, we can have few more columns and list down the triggers for mails, snaps, logs, exceptions, etc.

Only, major global chunks left to be estimated like Reviews, Manual Intervention, Integration, Configuring input & outputs and Logistics. These always depend on the scenario as well as need and sometimes specific percent is defined for these objects of total effort.

The above list surely looks like a big stretch but if we cover Application page row by row and detailing it as per the requirements as well as operations performed. This flow shows that we actually cover the Business as well as Automation script scenario implementation also. How, Defining and Deriving the Automation flow page by page and according to the operation will automatically define the Automation Script Flow also. This list will automatically work as Specification for any test and for Automation tester perspective it will be easy to identify in a single row what actually the implementation needs are as well as very easy to track in future and update.

 

Component of Frameworks to be Estimated

Small study on Core Framework below(for dividing the Framework Components into chunks): –

Framework

• Requirement Gathering
• Analysis & Design
• Prototyping
• Development/Implementation
• Integration/Unit Tests etc
• Integration
• Inputs/Outputs Configurations
• Management part like Reviews, Meetings, etc
• Logistics to be used to execute the TESTS/AUTOMATION
• Manual Interventions and at which levels

 

Task-Based Estimation

As per the above highlighted defined point, we need to assess our own Core Framework every component, For Example:-

• Core Framework
  • Inputs
    • What all type of inputs needed
    • Inputs Configurations/Structure or template definitions
    • Inputs reading operations
    • Where all these inputs need to be passed
  • Reporting
    • Type of report, like in HTML, Excel, XML, etc
    • What all to be reported
    • Reporting Structure
    • Results placements and further information customization points etc
  • Outputs
    • Type of outputs to be created like reports, logs, etc depends on reporting
    • Outputs writing operations
    • Formatting operations etc
  • Logs
    • Type of logs
    • Logs representations
    • Logs Input / Output operations,
  • Exceptions
    • Detailing the same as per the requirements
  • Automation tool or Framework
    • Selenium, Sikuli, QTP, etc.
  • Assertions/Checkpoints
    • Type of assertions
    • Implementation
  • Added Functionalities
    • Other added functionalities as per the requirements like Recoveries, Synchronizations, Mails & Snapshots, etc

Above defined architecture will be reusable and can be the core for any of the Automation Suite.

 

Highlights of both Feasibility Study and then Estimations

• Feasibility study is ready and ROI’s are in front
• Small presentation is ready with all PROS & CONS as well as exact expectation with Objective
• Whole idea to implement the Automation is detailed and with Estimations
• How much total effort is needed is on the papers
• How much we already spent is also on the papers, this also includes in total estimation
• Again if needed one brainstorming session can be possible to see that we need to move forward with this AUTOMATION or it is good to automate only specific or complex parts and at last, let’s drop this it is good to be manual.

 

Surely, the whole above analysis can be performed only by a team of colleagues who desire to make Automation useful at various avenues.