Limitations of automating testing

What can be the limitations of automating software testing?

- Designing a perfect automation script need some solid understanding of software development principles which automation testers lack most of the time. This is because they were not trained for development activities by organizations. Thus everyone follow their own standards while developing scripts.

- Many people who don't have proper understanding of automation, try to automate every thing. But it is not possible to do so because of time constraints and budget constraints.

- Automation testing can't replace manual testing.

- Where ever there is a change in UI, most the scripts need changes in their code and thus continuous maintenance.

- Testing tools are not as intelligent as human beings. They only have programmed intelligence which is very limited.

- Many automation developers think they should develop a automated testing script which can handle all possible situations by itself without manual intervention. But by doing so, we will end up in developing another software which is again very difficult to design, develop and maintain. It is not at all suggested to develop such scripts. Every script should assume some preconditions and should proceed assuming all required setup is available.

- Not all tools support all UI objects or all kinds of testing. Few tools are specialized for UI testing and few for DB testing and few for web testing and few for performance/load testing.
Principles of good testing scripts
Document the automated tests, Create reusable and maintable tests................
Testing activities to be automated
Tests that need to be run for every build of the application................
Skills for automation tester
I think an Automation Tester should have a good programming aptitude and willingness to abreast with new technologies and tools................
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