Effective ERP implementations are supposed to guarantee business benefits. MindTree knows that there is more to this than meets the eye. Right from the outset, ERP solutions need to address several problems, including connectivity to an unlimited number of legacy systems; the multiplicity of industry-specific solutions; and the sheer numbers of tables and transactions.

Maximizing the value and ROI from SAP ERP requires:

• Correct installation and customization of SAP based on documented requirements
• Extensive tests based on documented test cases and the end-to-end business scenario

For the testing of packaged application the focus is mainly on transactions and workflows. The different types of testing that are performed for packaged applications can be classified as:

Transaction Testing

Transaction Testing is testing of a single transaction (e.g. Create Sales Order) to confirm the operation of transactions and related configuration checks (e.g. default values, mandatory fields, etc.)

Workflow Testing

Workflow Testing (within a module) covers chains of transactions that flow together and which reflect important business process and scenarios (e.g. within the Sales process).

Workflow Testing

Workflow Testing (across modules or external applications) is end-to-end testing of integrated processes through execution of predefined business flows (within the ERP system or collaboration with legacy systems).

The different stages of the testing lifecycle for testing of package implementations are:

System Study

The project team will analyze the requirements in detail in this phase. The detailed base lined scenarios are an input to this phase. The activities in this phase include.

• Understand the business processes, & procedures, business blueprints, FRS documents & Business activity scripts. Access the BPP’ of implementation and derive the necessary inputs through those process documents
• Work closely with the client SAP team & gather the requirements
• Define high level scenarios that need to be tested in each module
• Identify missing documentation, if any
• Identify the extent of customization in the application
• Analyze and list the transactions that need to be automated and to be executed manually
• Identify the tool that will be used for automation
• Identify the external applications to which the application under test communicates
• Risks are identified and dependencies are informed to the client
• Identifying the correct master records to access and all the other needs of data for testing
• Estimate the effort

Strategy Planning

The main objective of this phase is to organize, manage and schedule the test effort. The plan is based on the test strategy. The plan identifies the tasks, the transactions/business scenarios to be automated or manually executed and the contingency plans for the identified risks, the schedule, roles and responsibilities and the deliverables from the MindTree testing team. The infrastructure required to carry out the tests is identified.

At this stage the high level scenarios for each are identified and a methodology to test the scenarios is planned. All business scenarios will be signed-off at this point.

Test Case / Script Design

In this phase the test data (master data, transaction data) is prepared by the subject matter experts, test framework is created or reused (in case of a client provided framework), scripts are created (for automation), reused (client provided) and reviewed, manual test cases are documented (for manual testing) and reviewed. A dry run is executed on the automated test scripts and results compared against manual test cases.

System Integration Testing & Reporting

All test cases (manual) and test scripts (automation) are executed and the subject matter experts and the client analyze the results. Defects are logged and defect reports such as defect trend and summary are sent to the client. The testing team will categorize the automation test defects from the actual functional defects, for automation execution. Reporting will be done at intervals agreed upon by MindTree and the client. The reports will contain details on the progress of testing, project metrics, defect statistics and issues faced if any.

Release

On MindTree delivering all deliverables successfully, the client will sign off all the deliverables of test automation (test automation plan, test scripts, test data pool, etc) and deliverables for manual testing (test plan & strategy, test cases, test data) along with the test reports.

UAT

This phase involves in supporting the client for functional & technical issues by the MindTree subject matter experts.