Undoubtedly, Oracle E-business Suite (EBS) Application is a widely used ERP app. Unlike other open source technologies such as PHP, it is built using ‘Oracle forms’. It is really difficult to test it since it is developed using Oracle’s proprietary technology. Furthermore, Oracle EBS can be customized and can be integrated seamlessly with third party applications, making it more difficult to test. Apart from this, Oracle releases several enhancements and bug-fixes periodically for customers. So, repetitive reruns of tests are necessary with new releases. Thus, it is recommended that you should use reliable automation testing software to test new releases as well as your cloud migration. However, finding the right automation software for Oracle EBS testing is a daunting task as success of test automation depends on identifying the right tool for the project. As a range of automation tools are available, we’ve curated the list of top automation tools.
Oracle Automation Testing Solution (OATS)
OATS is Oracle’s own test automation tool that offers full compatibility with its applications. With built-in automation components, OATS makes it easy for you to design test and setup processes. It also offers some premium features like scheduling for regression testing and test data creation. It reduces the amount of manual testing and can cut down script creation time by 50%. Though OATS is Oracle’s test application yet it has certain limitations. It has limited cross-technology functionality. It means if you’re doing integration testing and third party or home-grown applications are accessible through a web browser then OATS would be a best tool. However, if apps support cross-technology platforms, then you need additional automation tools to achieve complete test coverage. Another limitation is Oracle’s testing language “OpenScript”. It is difficult to learn and less technical people may find it difficult to work with “OpenScript”.
Selenium
It is an open-source test automation tool widely used for web GUI testing. It consists of several tools such as Selenium IDE, Selenium Grid, etc. With Selenium, you can perform parallel testing. Support for multiple programming languages like C#, JAVA, Python, etc., makes it a perfect choice for testers and developers for application testing. One of the downsides of Selenium is that you need to code to set up and maintain your tests. When it comes to applications like Oracle EBS, they are very complex and testing these with Selenium becomes a tedious and time-consuming affair in the long run. Selenium uses element properties like ID, Name, Class, etc to identify a control on the screen. However, Oracle Cloud Applications use web elements with dynamic locators that don’t have fixed attributes like ID, Name, class or CSS. So, Selenium cannot be used to test Oracle Cloud Applications. Another limitation of Selenium is that it wouldn’t be able to handle frames and iframes in Oracle Applications.
Opkey
Opkey is the industry’s leading continuous testing platform that supports the entire Oracle landscape. With support for the widest range of applications including desktop, web, mobile, mainframe, etc, OpKey accelerates test creation by 3X-5X as compared to other automation tools and makes maintenance a breeze with self-healing technology. OpKey comes with pre-built test scripts for Oracle Cloud and helps you to leverage context and metadata of Oracle Cloud to build more maintainable tests. OpKey offers 750+ Test Cases across Oracle HCM based on 500+ reusable libraries, 400+ Test cases in Financial with 175+ reusable libraries, and 350+ Test cases across SCM, Project Cloud and Procurement Cloud. Furthermore, OpKey can seamlessly handle dynamically changing Ids, complex tables and custom controls. With OpKey, you can orchestrate your test process across multiple applications while gaining visibility and business assurance across the entire application ecosystem. You can use AI based algorithms to generate data sets for optimal risk coverage. OpKey enables you to execute tests applications across 50+ browser OS combinations and hundreds of real mobile devices.
HP UFT
HP UFT has gained great appreciation for automating testing of most of the web based applications, Windows based applications and Oracle Products. HP UFT supports multiple technologies and automates testing without requiring much of the manual intervention. It is very flexible in terms of test script design and can be integrated seamlessly with widely used test management tools like HP-ALM. The downside of HP UFT is maintenance of the test script is a pain. It also has some limitations related to API testing or Mobile Testing. Lastly, it is not quite suitable for a fast paced agile environment or with applications that get changed frequently.
LoadRunner
It is an Oracle EBS Performance Testing platform that supports various development tools, technologies and communication protocols. For EBS, LoadRunner offers two different communication mechanisms i.e. Oracle-Web & NCA. With support for multiple OS platforms, mobile device & cloud testing, LoadRunner allows you to easily record the test scripts, run tests and analyse results when simultaneous users are accessing the application. Some of the limitations related to LoadRunner are slow test design, coding, and high script maintenance. It is not natively designed for agile testing and requires deep expertise for testing.
Bottom Line
Finding the best automation tool is very critical as it acts as a differentiating factor between success and failure of ERP implementation. You need thorough analysis and deep evaluation while selecting the best fit tool with cost being a vital parameter. The above shared analysis will enable users to make a smart selection.
