There are all kinds of software that test automation tools can integrate with, and a great tool can integrate with them all!
In our last article in this series, we talked about how your test automation tool needs to integrate with your CI/CD tools. Part of Continuous Integration is the feedback loop that we mentioned, so your testing tool should integrate with other software to alert you immediately to any problems found in testing. By integrating with other software like Jenkins, Azure, GitHub, and even Slack, you can not only be notified when any bugs are found, but some of these tools also help maximize your CI/CD cycle. We'll take a look at some of the most popular software for integrating with testing tools so you can be sure that you're getting everything you can out of your testing tool.
Now some of the most popular CI/CD tools out there are Jenkins and CircleCI. Jenkins is an on-premise, open-source automation server while CircleCI is, as is in the name, primarily a cloud-based Continuous Integration tool, though it does work with Continuous Delivery as well. Both of these platforms automate the building, testing, and deploying of new updates to your software or app. In other words, they automate all of your Continuous Integration needs plus deploying at the right time with Continuous Delivery, so it can be helpful to integrate your testing to make sure that you're also conducting Continuous Testing.
By integrating your automated testing directly with your CI/CD tool, whichever it may be, you can make life a little easier by managing everything in one place. Ideally, you should be able to schedule and run tests from within your CI/CD tool as well as get alerts to test results when they've finished running. Since CI/CD is all about efficiency, integrations help streamline that process.
Getting notified of a test result is great as long as you get it somewhere where you'll see it. Maybe you don't check your email as often as you should or skip a day checking in on your testing tool. We get it, we're all human after all (except our bots), so you should make it easier on yourself by integrating with an app that you have more access to! Integrate with apps like Microsoft Teams or Slack so you can get notifications on any device you like and respond instantly to any failed tests.
Another type of software you can integrate your testing with is development tools like GitHub and Azure. From these platforms, you can both schedule your tests to run at any point and get test results in-app. This enables you to both shift left and shift right with your testing by testing at any time both pre-and post-deployment since your testing will work in tangent with your code.
This will probably come as no surprise, but Virtuoso will integrate with them all! As many tools as you like. You can check out a few more integrations that we have; not only is this not an exhaustive list, but Virtuoso also has an open API so you can work with us to create a custom integration. You can get in touch with us if you're ready to integrate Virtuoso into your tech stack!
