There’s no doubt that quality assurance (QA) within the DevOps culture of continuous integration and deployment helps to ensure the ongoing quality of software releases. Especially as QA experts collaborate with development and operations teams to ensure that the software meets quality standards, is free of defects and aligns with customer expectations in an efficient and timely manner.

But, not surprisingly, there are still challenges for QA teams within DevOps. One of the most significant is the need to “shift left” and be involved in testing and quality activities earlier in the development cycle, which requires adapting to faster development cycles and collaborating closely with developers to integrate testing and quality practices from the start.

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Which of the following best describes how you currently monitor and manage systems across your hybrid cloud environment?(Required)

Multiple separate tools for different environments

Multiple separate tools for different monitoring and management functions

Single consolidated dashboard

Custom built monitoring and management solution

No full monitoring and management solution

Don’t know

How valuable would it be for your monitoring and management solution to incorporate predictive analytics to help you identify and address system issues that are critical and not waste time or effort working through all the data and “noise” that is not critical?(Required)

Extremely valuable

Moderately valuable

Somewhat valuable

Slightly valuable

Not valuable

How do you most typically address potential system issues BEFORE they impact your operations?(Required)

Automated workflows and playbooks to remediate potential issues as soon as they are detected

An orchestrated response process that leverages automation, AI, and human expertise to rapidly respond to potential issues

Advanced monitoring tools such as predictive analytics and anomaly detection to proactively identify and address potential issues

Respond to issues as they arise, using manual processes and troubleshooting techniques

A combination of automated remediation, orchestrated response, and/or proactive monitoring to address potential system issues

Don’t know

Other

What methods does your organization use to control and monitor cloud/IT spending?(Required)

Centralized procurement processes

Pre-approved budget thresholds

Automated cost monitoring tools

Department-level spending controls

Regular cost audits and reviews

Cloud cost optimization platform

Approval workflows for resource provisioning

Native financial operations tools provided by the cloud provider

No formal controls in place

Don’t know

Other

Please specify:

Which methods do you rely on most to detect security vulnerabilities in your systems?(Required)

Automated scanning tools

Manual assessments

Vendor notifications

Threat modeling (for early detection)

None of these

Don’t know

Other

Please specify:

What are the TWO most common ways you prioritize vulnerabilities to address within your environment?(Required)

Based on potential impact

Based on exploitability

Regulatory compliance requirements

Based on CVSS scores

Risk-based analysis of multiple factors

First-in-first-out approach

No formal prioritization process

Don’t know

How do you typically handle system updates and security patches?(Required)

Automated updates and patches

Manually review and apply updates and patches on a regular schedule

A combination of automation and manual review

Apply updates and patches on an as-needed basis.

Outsourced update and patch management

No defined process

Don’t know

Other

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This places additional stress on QA experts who must react faster while being increasingly tasked with building and maintaining robust automated testing frameworks. When timelines matter, this can become a considerable issue.

Additionally, QA professionals must also work collaboratively with developers, operations teams and other stakeholders. If cultures are opposed, this can severely impact development cycles.

Lastly, with frequent code deployments and configuration changes, maintaining consistent and reliable test environments becomes crucial.

But amid these challenges, there are many opportunities.

QA experts can contribute to early and continuous testing, collaborate with cross-functional teams, leverage automation and tooling, engage in continuous learning and take ownership of end-to-end quality. QA experts play a crucial role in ensuring high-quality software delivery in the DevOps environment.

Crowdtesting Within DevOps

Crowdtesting can play a significant role in DevOps throughout the entire software development life cycle (SDLC). Here are just a few benefits:

1. Faster Feedback: Crowdtesting brings diverse testers with various devices and configurations, allowing for quick issue identification and resolution in agile development.
2. Scalability and Flexibility: Crowdtesting easily scales up or down based on project needs, accommodating frequent updates and releases and ensuring testing coverage even during peak periods.
3. Real-world Environments: Crowdtesting provides insights into software performance under diverse conditions, including network speeds, hardware configurations and geographic locations, improving quality and user experience.
4. CI/CD Integration: Crowdtesting seamlessly integrates into CI/CD pipelines, enabling continuous testing of each iteration, catching issues early and reducing regression risks.
5. User Feedback: Crowdtesting gathers feedback from real users, offering valuable insights on usability, functionality and customer experience, aiding decision-making and feature prioritization.
6. Localization and Internationalization: Crowdtesting helps test localized versions and internationalization support, incorporating language translations, cultural nuances, and regional requirements, ensuring a global user base and enhanced market reach.

Automation and DevOps

Crowdtesting can also complement automation.

Within DevOps, automation plays a crucial role in continuous integration, delivery, and also testing – especially for unit testing, integration testing, functional testing, and performance testing – but there are times when manual testing, including crowdtesting, remains relevant and beneficial.

Do you want a realistic way to assess the usability and user experience aspects of your software? Human crowdtesters can provide subjective feedback, identify user experience issues, and offer suggestions for improvement – all within real-world scenarios that automated tests may miss.

Crowdtesters also possess the creativity and intuition to perform exploratory testing, where they actively explore the software to uncover unforeseen bugs, usability issues, or edge cases.

The same goes for user acceptance testing, where a specific target audience evaluates the software against their specific needs and requirements. These types of testing require human intelligence and critical thinking skills that automation cannot easily replicate.

This is especially true when it comes to edge cases, unusual scenarios and non-standard user interactions, which often require creative thinking. Manual crowdtesting can uncover potential issues that automated tests overlook.

But ultimately, it is the ability to test in diverse real-world environments, configurations and geographical locations where crowdtesting makes the biggest impact.

By leveraging both approaches, you can achieve a robust testing process that ensures software quality, usability and a positive user experience.