Test Scenarios, Test Cases and Test Design

In software testing life cycle, the third phase is Test Design, in that third phase of STCL Test Scenarios, Test cases and Test Design are created. 

Many QA peoples often get confused in between Test Scenario and Test Cases and few of them even consider both are same. The output from the Test Scenario is considered as a input to test cases. Few examples are given down. We will discuss each term one by one. Lets start with Test Scenarios.

Test Scenarios:

Test scenarios are also called test condition and it is very easy to find out the test scenarios we just need to read requirements properly. For one test Scenario there can be a multiples test cases.

Scenarios can be considered as a broader point of view and shorter point of view also.

See the following examples

Example - 1 : login page

Requirements -

• Login page. 
• Login page should have remember me button.
• Login page should have forget password option.
• Login page should have reset button.

These are the requirements for the Login modules.

Test Scenarios: (from Broader prospective)

• Evaluating the login page.
• Evaluation the remember me button.
• Evaluation the remember me button.
• Evaluation the remember me button.

These are the test scenarios for the login page. Scenarios may varies company to company some company look for depth scenarios and some company consider as broader manner.

Example 2: Inquiry form

Requirements :

• Inquiry form should have Name, contact number, email id, and description field
• Inquiry form should have Update option.
• Delete functionality for Inquiry Deletion.
• Suppose these are the few requirements for the Inquiry form.

Test Scenarios :

If we consider scenarios as broader prospective. Then scenarios as shown follows.

• Evaluate Inquiry form.
• Evaluate Update functionality of the Inquiry form.
• Evaluate Delete functionality of the Inquiry form.

Some companies consider scenarios as follow also

• Evaluate the Name field of Inquiry form.
• Evaluate the Contact number filed of Inquiry form.
• Evaluate the email Id field of Inquiry form.
• Evaluate the Description field of Inquiry form. 
• Evaluate the Name field while editing the inquiry form.
• Evaluate the Contact number field while editing the inquiry form.
• Evaluate the email Id field while editing the inquiry form.
• Evaluate the Description field while editing the inquiry form.
• Evaluate the Delete functionality of Inquiry form.

These are two ways we can find the scenarios. Some companies prefer first way other prefers second ways.

Lets see how can we write the Test cases for Derived Test Scenarios.

Test Cases:

Test cases are like a steps, how we are going to test each and every requirement, it is like a performing pre-created steps and just verify the output whether it matches with expected output or not.

Test cases has many things like test case id, objective,pre-requisite, steps, test data, expected output, actual output, status/result and remark, again these fields may vary company to company. Lets see the meaning of each field.

Test case ID: it is unique id for each test case.

Objective: it is the objective of test. For example : check the login functionality for valid credentials.

Pre-requisite: it is the pre-conditions which is need or mandatory to execute the test cases i.e. like to login into the Zmail to executte this test case it is mandatory that login page of Zmail should be launched in browser. So the pre-requisite is Zmail page should be launched.

Test Steps: it is the steps to execute that test cases.

Test Data: Test data is a data which is requires for that test cases execution (also explained below).

Expected Output : means what output should system give if we performs this test cases on system.

Actual Output : Means after performing this steps on system, the system produced out is called actual output. If Actual output and Expected Output are different then it can be said that the bug is present in the system.

Status: status of the test cases means pass or fail, if actual and expected output matches with each other means test case passed else fail.

How to write the test cases for the scenarios:

Lets consider the scenarios written in above. Take a example of Inquiry form the first scenarios is:

Scenario 1: Evaluate the Name field of Inquiry form

• Check the minimum character.
• Check the minimum character.
• Check the response when we enter digit in Name filed.
• Check the response when we enter special char in Name field.
• Check the response when we enter Character in Name Field. 

And much more…..

Scenario 2:Evaluate the Contact number filed of Inquiry form.

• Check if is accept the digit or not.
• Check by entering 11 digit.
• Check by entering 9 digit.
• Check by entering char.
• Check by entering symbols.
• Check by keeping this filed empty.

And much more…

Like shown above you can write the test cases for every Scenarios.

Test Data:

The test cases which we are written above obviously requires some data, that data nothing but Test Data.means the Data which is require to execute the test cases is Test Data.it is very important to collect proper data. Sometime client give test data to us. But many time we need to create the test data.

For example if out test case is like

Test Case : verify the login with valid credentials.

Test Date : User-name : Valid UID password : Valid PASS

Test case : verify the login functionality by altering the user-name and password.

Test Data : User-name : Valid PASS password : Valid UID

Test case : verify the login functionality by entering the special symbols in it.

Test Data : User-name :String of special characters (#$@#$ etc)  password : String of special characters (#$@#$ etc)

Test case : verify the inquiry form by entering valid data.

Test Data :  

• Name : XYZ
• Contact number : 95123*****
• Email : youremail@domainname.com
• Description : inquired about courses.

These are the few examples.

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