Test Data Management Best Practices

Test Data Management Best Practices help the QA team to deliver the high- quality results and plays a vital role in the software testing process. Generally, it contains all data required to test the functionalities which include positive, negative, invalid data to handle the success, error and exception results. Creating and maintaining the test data is a critical task for the testing team. Let us see some of the best practices followed while performing automation testing.

Test data creation

Test data is constructed based on the test cases to be executed. It should be created in parallel with the development phase and for each functionality or module to be tested. Working in tandem with the development cycle helps to communicate with the developers regarding the expectations.

Externalise & Reusability

In automation, test data should always be externalized like .property, .csv files etc. Externalizing the test data helps to encapsulate the automation code base and allows to make test data changes without impacting the framework.

Here is the list of formats you could store and use in such automation framework.
1. CSV files
2. Property files
3. MS Excel files
4. Database
5. Text files
6. XML files
7. JSON files

Protect the sensitive data

Many times in order to test the applications, sensitive data is required such as user credential, names, addresses, financial information, and contact details. These sensitive data must be identified and should have a mechanism to safeguard it. Masking helps secure sensitive corporate, client, and employee information from exposure in the non-production environment.

Cleaning the test data

This strategy helps to rollback the executed used test data to its original state which ensures and maintains the repeatability of the tests along with the test data. It involves refresh/restore the test data to its original state after the test execution (it can be done before starting the next phase execution also). It can be achieved by taking the snapshot/backup of the test repository or database and then restoring it to the original state or clearing the test data after the execution.

Please contact us to learn more about our process in automation testing and test data management.