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Original Software: The Power to Self-Heal


Function tester lets the blind lead the inexperienced

By Alex Handy
April 1, 2006 — 
Claiming to put application testing in the hands of inexperienced users, Original Software in March debuted Test Drive Gold 1.0, a point-and click tool that it says can test user interface functionality of Web-based and stand-alone Windows and Java applications.

Test Drive Gold records a user’s actions within a GUI, and saves them for automated replay as a functionality test. Recorded tests can be automatically played back later on.

According to Colin Armitage, CEO of Original Software, tests designed in Test Drive Gold can find the appropriate buttons and boxes by matching the descriptions attached to them that would otherwise be intended for the blind. “We use Microsoft and Java accessibility standards to do this,” he said. “We are able to understand the content of the application under test without any plug-ins.”

Armitage claimed the tool also can adapt to interface changes as an application is being developed. “If the application changes, as far as is humanly possible, Test Drive Gold will attempt to deal with information being shuffled around the screen and [on] new screens being added,” he said. If the program gives up trying, he added, it will prompt the user with something like: “I give up. You tell me what’s happened in this new version.”

But the biggest feather in Test Drive Gold’s cap, said Armitage, is the complete lack of a need for scripting, which he said enables the tool to be used by just about anyone in an organization. The tool was designed for the novice tester, he added. “If you can’t crack dealing with changing applications, no one wants to waste time and money building up test scripts,” he asserted. “There is no scripting language at all, not even a little bit, anywhere.”

Test Drive Gold is available now for US$8,000 per concurrent user.


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