Testmace team introduction

19.12.2018TestMaceNo Comments

1. Motivation

Dealing with API development and API testing, we played around with lots of different tools, as there are dozens of them these days. Some of them are quite good, powerful and beautiful indeed. Switching from one tool to another, we faced various problems and disadvantages, most of which we were able to solve. Despite this, we couldn’t help feeling that there is no perfect tool for us yet 🙂 Now while you are reading this, we are working on our wonderful tool for API development and testing! Our application will allow not only to quickly configure and send requests using powerful features, such as variables, scope, and data entry fields with highlighting and autocompletion of every single thing, but also to write autotests using a very nice and simple test builder. We are planning to create a tool that will prove useful to both developers and testers, helping to improve interaction among team members.

2. About the Product

In the very first version of the product we tried to lay the foundations for the future usability of the tool. For instance, we implemented the variables mechanism, that allows to define both global and node scoped variables. Variables help to store and reuse any data in any part of the app in the same way.

This mechanism provides an opportunity to work with complex scenarios, that might be useful in automated use case testing, as well as in performing non-standard authorization and other things. In our application it is possible to create scenarios like these by grouping certain requests and running them automatically, referring in every new request to the results of the previous ones and using any described entities with entities reference.

Syntax highlighting and autocomplete feature help while working with variables. Every text box is equipped with these to significantly improve usability and make the process of configuring requests faster.

We also paid considerable attention to the Undo/Redo function. We made it work in different parts of the application. For example, you can undo the changes you made in a particular request or even in the project file structure. One of the most important features of the tool is the project storage format. Your requests and scenarios structure mirrors the project structure in the file system, and there is a special format for requests and tests, that are stored in separate YAML files. This is for developers and testers to work together on the same project, using the version control system and tried and tested in developers’ environment code review practices.

For this purpose they will be advised to use special import/export mechanisms to support some standard formats, that you can find in other popular tools. Moreover, the Share button will help quickly send your configured request to a colleague. You can also choose from different automation testing strategies: either use a graphical test generator or write your own Javascript test with your favoriteJavascript libraries.

In addition, we are planning to implement such great features as API import with Swagger and WSDL support and automated test generation based on API documentation. First, we’ll deal with smoke, boundary and security tests generation, then hope to suggest a solution for more complex test.

3. Our Team

Our team is our pride and the main achievement. Each of us is a professional software developer, having solid experience in the field. Our knowledge and desire to make our work and work of our colleagues more convenient are pushing us to improve our product faster.

4. Future Plans

The main goal for us today is to release a beta version of the product. I suppose, the first is going to be a closed beta, so we’d appreciate if you could try a new tool out in your work and help us with your feedback. You can become a beta tester here: beta.testmace.com. We are starting our closed beta in January, 2019. The following two months will be devoted to analyzing your comments and suggestions to present our tool to the community in April. We realize though, that our tool is short of some features that might seem essential for the great part of users. For instance, in the first version of the tool team members can work on tests and scenarios together only by using the version control system. Solutions like this allow us to get a prompt feedback, providing enthusiasts with flexibility and letting them solve day-to-day problems right now. Our global plans include considering the whole API life cycle, expanding our tool functionality, and creating new tools for API documentation, monitoring and testing.

5. Our Message to You

For us professional software developers and QA engineers are the most valuable source of knowledge for defining requirements and implementing functionality of our product. We suggest you take part in its development. For this, we create and introduce special tools, such as the feature request system with a voting function, the public bug tracker with a participants motivation system, and so on. Your name will also be displayed in our acknowledgments section 🙂 And don’t hesitate to email us your comments and suggestions at [email protected]. Make sure to follow us on social media: