Global Market Insights predicts 18% growth of the automated regression testing segment by 2027, while it already accounted for 15% of the market share in 2020. Not surprisingly, software houses are releasing more and more automated regression testing solutions to tap into the growing market and capitalize on customer demand.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain Management, as one of the leading ERP systems, also has a variety of solutions that can be used for regression testing.
One of them, the Regression Suite Automation Tool (RSAT), was developed by Microsoft itself. If you are interested in using this tool, read this article to learn more about regression testing with RSAT.
What Are the Benefits of Regression Suite Automation Tool?
Source: smartbear.com
RSAT, the automation tool for user acceptance testing (UAT) of Microsoft Dynamics 365 financial and supply chain management applications, offers several notable benefits.
Most of these are associated with automated testing in general. RSAT reduces the time required for daunting regression testing through automation and minimizes the likelihood of human error, resulting in substantial savings for organizations.
At the same time, RSAT has unique features that make it particularly desirable for companies that want to automate testing of their ERP system.
One of them is the free distribution of RSAT, which is undoubtedly one of its biggest advantages. Companies can easily download the tool from the official Microsoft website and use it to test their ERP system.
Another notable feature of RSAT is its low coding requirements. RSAT aims to minimize coding with its test libraries. These are fully integrated with the DevOps Test Plan, which is stored in the Business Process Modeler (BPM).
BPM provides tools for creating test scenarios with visual tools and translates these processes into the steps, interactions, and conditions of test cases. BPM also helps with test execution and the identification of the processes that require regression testing after code modifications.
Moreover, the newer versions of RSAT support parallel execution, which allows users to open and run the RSAT application more than once in the same environment, enabling simultaneous execution of different test tasks, such as running tests in one application and creating new tests in another.
This is especially useful for multiple users sharing the same environment to work more effectively. In addition, organizations that set up Azure DevOps validation pipelines can split large test sets into smaller ones to run simultaneously in multiple pipelines.
Concerns Regarding Testing with RSAT
Source: learn.microsoft.com
Although RSAT has many positive aspects, some concerns about this tool should be considered.
1. Limited Coverage of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Applications
RSAT is specifically designed to test Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain Management, the enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. Although many companies have implemented only this software from the large ERP and CRM suite or use only a single module for finance or supply chain management, these limitations are critical for organizations using other modules too.
2. Lack of Support for Performance Testing
Even though RSAT is equipped with decent functionality for UAT and unit testing, organizations cannot use this tool for performance testing, although this is a critical evaluation that should not be neglected by organizations using Microsoft Dynamics 365 FSCM to execute critical business operations.
3. Low Scalability
Despite the support that BPM provides to RSAT users that can be leveraged for code maintenance, as the number of changes in the software increases, it can become a challenge since tests need to be updated.
4. Hidden Costs
Although RSAT is a free solution, its complexity comes with costs associated with the work of professional testers. Creating and managing test scripts with RSAT requires supervision from testing experts, while users without technical knowledge will hardly be able to work with this tool. Overall, this extends time-to-market and negatively impacts return on investment.
Regression Suite Automation Tool Alternatives
RSAT is just one of the automated regression testing solutions available on the market. Some of them share the same strengths as this application and are free from its limitations.
For example, both Selenium and Executive Automats, two testing solutions that are quite different from each other, support testing of other applications provided by the Microsoft Dynamics 365 ERP and CRM suite. While Selenium is a flexible framework that can be set up for automated testing of various software products, including Microsoft Dynamics 365 modules other than Finance and SCM, Executive Automats is a ready-to-use product for complex testing of this software.
Furthermore, Executive Automats is a powerful performance-testing solution that places no limits on the number of concurrent users. While Selenium is primarily used for functional testing, it can also be used to measure the load and responsiveness of applications.
Conclusion – Is RSAT the Right Choice for Your Company?
Regression Suite Automation Tool may be a viable choice for an organization that relies solely on Microsoft Dynamics 365 FSCM, as it cannot be used to test other modules of the Microsoft Dynamics 365 suite.
A company that chooses RSAT should also look for a separate solution for performance testing, which is critical to evaluating the ERP system but is not covered by RSAT. On top of that, despite the seemingly simple low-code approach used in RSAT, your staff should have the technical knowledge to work with this tool, as it is quite complex.
Alternatively, you can opt for Executive Automats, a more user-friendly and feature-rich solution that is suitable for testing the entire Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM and ERP suite and helps you with performance testing. Another option is to set up a Selenium testing environment tailored to your company’s needs with the help of professional developers.
