Smoke testing is a vital software testing technique that helps validate whether a new build is stable enough to proceed further in the release process. For product managers, incorporating effective smoke testing into the development cycle can provide numerous benefits that ultimately lead to higher-quality product releases.
This blog post will provide an overview of what exactly smoke testing entails, including the different types of smoke tests. We’ll also discuss several advantages smoke testing provides specifically for product managers, such as catching defects early, verifying features work as expected, and reducing post-launch risks. By understanding how to integrate smoke tests into the software development life cycle (SDLC), product managers can leverage this testing strategy to ship products that delight customers.
What is Smoke Testing?
Smoke testing refers to a preliminary testing effort conducted on new software builds to reveal simple failures before further, more rigorous testing occurs. The overarching goal is to spot any “showstopper” defects that would block a release from proceeding to the next stages of testing.
Several types of smoke tests exist:
- Build verification tests: Quick automated tests to confirm the build compiles, installs, and launches without crashing. Checks for syntax issues.
- Integration tests: Confirm connections between integrated components are functioning. API tests fall into this category.
- Regression tests: Re-run a subset of existing tests on the new build to check for unexpected breaks.
- User journey tests: Validate the happy paths for critical user workflows and scenarios.
Smoke tests focus on the most important core functionality, not obscure edge cases. They should be fast, lightweight, and give a quick “yes/no” on basic stability. The aim is not to comprehensively validate everything works as designed. Rather, it’s to spot any glaring issues that show the build is not ready for further QA.
Key goals and purposes of smoke testing include:
- Catch severe blocking defects as early as possible
- Assess whether the build is stable enough to proceed to more exhaustive testing
- Provide confidence to stakeholders that a commit or release meets basic quality criteria
- Prevent wasted effort debugging issues that should have been caught earlier
By incorporating smoke testing throughout the development lifecycle, teams can save significant time and headaches down the line.
Benefits for Product Managers
As stewards of product quality and the customer experience, product managers have a vested interest in ensuring smoke testing is built into the development process. Some key benefits smoke testing provides for product managers include:
- Verifies new features and capabilities work as expected before releasing – Smoke tests exercise the happy paths through critical user journeys and confirm the software responds properly. This helps catch defects where a new feature isn’t working right even though existing functionality still passes.
- Catches major defects early before they impact customers – By running smoke tests with every new build, product managers can detect serious issues while they are still easy to fix. This prevents disruptive bugs from being found late in the release process.
- Provides rapid feedback on overall product stability – With automated smoke tests, product managers quickly learn about any glaring problems in the latest build and can assess release readiness.
- Reduces risk of catastrophic failures after going live – Smoke testing decreases the chances of a disastrous production bug that damages customer trust or loyalty.
- Confirms integration points between components work correctly – Smoke tests verify connections between integrated systems are functioning properly.
- Saves time spent in extensive troubleshooting post-launch – Finding showstopper defects late leads to wasted QA cycles debugging problems versus testing new functionality.
Integrating Smoke Tests into the SDLC
To fully realize the benefits of smoke testing, product managers need to ensure it is integrated throughout the software development life cycle (SDLC). Here are some best practices:
- Execute smoke tests during continuous integration (CI) – By automating smoke tests and running them against every new code commit and build, defects can be caught immediately.
- Clearly define smoke test scope and coverage – The test suite should include validation of the most important happy paths through critical user journeys, as well as API/integration points between components. Input from both engineering and product is key.
- Establish pass/fail criteria – Product managers should align with QA on quantifiable PASS/FAIL standards for smoke testing aligned to the “definition of done”.
- Rigorously smoke test before UAT – No build should proceed to user acceptance testing (UAT) without passing smoke testing first. This prevents wasting time and resources on unstable builds.
- Include smoke tests in regression testing strategy – Smoke tests should also be incorporated into regression test suites run against new builds.
- Collaborate across teams on smoke testing – Product managers should partner closely with QA and engineering to determine the right criteria and coverage for smoke tests.
- Track detailed smoke testing metrics – Log all failures, anomalies, times, and results. Analyze trends to assess release readiness.
- Leverage for early feedback, not final validation – Smoke testing augments deeper functional validation. It’s about early warning indicators, not comprehensive QA.
Considerations for Product Managers
Product managers have an important role to play in ensuring smoke testing delivers maximum value. Here are some key considerations:
- Prioritize validation of most important features/flows – Work with engineers and QA to identify the 20% of functionality that drives 80% of customer value. Focus smoke tests there.
- Balance thorough validation versus speed – Smoke tests should provide meaningful confidence in quality but not take too long. Validate the most critical paths but avoid exhaustive edge cases.
- Set clear quantitative pass/fail criteria – Establish unambiguous thresholds for passing smoke tests based on goals for defects found, test cases executed, metrics thresholds, etc.
- Use smoke testing as an early indicator of release readiness – Let smoke test results inform go/no-go decisions on releasing builds to broader testing.
- Collaborate closely with QA/engineering – Partner with them to define the right scope, coverage, and thresholds. Provide input on critical customer workflows.
- Consider the impact on integrations – Smoke tests should validate that interfaces between integrated systems are working properly.
- Don’t ignore customer workflows – Walk through critical use cases from the user’s perspective to ensure no obvious issues.
- Balance happy paths and edge cases – Smoke tests focus on happy paths but some edge cases are also important to include based on risk.
- Ensure proper test environments – Smoke tests should run on environments that mirror real-world production as closely as possible.
- View smoke testing as part of quality strategy – Promote the use of smoke testing as part of instilling a culture of quality.
Best Practices for Effective Smoke Testing
Here are some best practices product managers can follow to ensure smoke testing is as efficient and valuable as possible:
- Keep smoke tests short, simple, and automated – They should take minutes to run, not hours. Automate whenever possible.
- Focus on the “happy paths” – Validate the most important mainstream user workflows rather than obscure edge cases.
- Target critical integration points – Major APIs and dependencies between systems merit extra smoke test validation.
- Reuse existing functional test cases where possible – This saves test creation effort and leverages existing work.
- Execute smoke tests early and often – Run them with every new build and code commit via continuous integration.
- Define clear quantitative PASS/FAIL criteria – Removes ambiguity on what constitutes a release-blocking smoke test failure.
- Use realistic test environments – Smoke test environments should match production as closely as possible in terms of configuration.
- Assign responsibility for authoring/executing – Both a product manager and engineer should “own” the smoke testing process.
- Track detailed test results – Log full details on test case failures, anomalies, times, and environment details for analysis.
- Triage failures urgently – When smoke tests fail, all hands get on deck to determine if the release blocking or not.
- Use smoke testing for early feedback – It’s about informing go/no-go decisions, not replacing comprehensive QA.
- Review and update regularly – Smoke test coverage should evolve based on risk, complexity, and priority.
Conclusion
Smoke testing is a simple yet highly valuable testing strategy that product managers should fully leverage. By incorporating automated smoke tests that validate critical functionality and integration points, defects can be caught early before impacting customers. This provides rapid feedback on build stability, reduces downstream QA cycles, and minimizes the risk of catastrophic post-production failures.
Product managers play an integral role in ensuring smoke testing is built into the product development lifecycle. From collaborating on test scope to setting clear pass/fail criteria to using results to inform release readiness, there are many areas where product management can help maximize the benefits of smoke testing. By following the best practices outlined, product managers can release higher-quality products that exceed customer expectations.
The small time investment needed to implement effective smoke testing processes pays massive dividends in reduced debugging time, faster release cycles, and improved customer satisfaction. Make smoke testing a cornerstone of your quality assurance strategy.
