Visual GUI testing in Continuous Integration

Abstract

Continuous Integration (CI) is a well-established process within software development, used to prevent problems with integration and to improve software quality. One part of the process is to test the code-base with automated tests and usually low-level tests are used for this purpose. Visual GUI Testing (VGT) was presented to complement the process of regression testing and has previously been shown to be a robust and flexible enough technique to be used as automated testing in industrial practice. This study shows that high level VGT tests works in a CI process in a small web-development environment with no prior automated testing. It also presents the advantages and disadvantages when introducing VGT as the only automated test technique. Furthermore, it presents that VGT tests can improve the business value of the application and code base, in this context.