EXIGEN® SERVICES:

TESTING SERVICES
WHITE PAPER

1. SUMMARY
2. TESTING SERVICES OVERVIEW
2.1. TEST AUTOMATION SERVICES
2.2. MANUAL TESTING SERVICES
2.3. PERFORMANCE AND LOAD TESTING SERVICES
2.4. LEGACY REJUVENATION SERVICES
2.5. SECURITY TESTING SERVICES
3. METHODOLOGY OVERVIEW
3.1. DATA PROTECTION AND CONFIDENTIALITY
3.2. COLLABORATION WITH THE CLIENT
4. ABOUT EXIGEN® SERVICES
FACTS AND FIGURES
Ŷ Headquarters:
San Francisco, USA
Ŷ Main offices and delivery
centers:
USA: New York
Europe: London, Frankfurt,
Stockholm, Copenhagen, Riga,
Vilnius
Russia: St. Petersburg, Kazan,
and Nizhniy Novgorod
Ukraine: Dnepropetrovsk and
Odessa
Belarus: Minsk
China: Suzhou
Ŷ Number of employees: 2000
EXIGEN SERVICES SQA
PRACTICE
Ŷ Over 250 dedicated quality
engineers, many of whom have
certifications from well-respected
authorities such as International
Software Testing Qualifications
Board (ISTQB)
Ŷ Combines 1000’ man/years
experience of mission-critical
software testing project in indus-
tries such as financial services,
telecommunications and health-
care
Ŷ Lead by Girts Baltaisbrencis,
chair of Latvian Software Testing
Qualifications Board (LSTQB)
SUMMARY
Exigen Services offers a broad range of bespoke application testing ser-
vices aimed at assuring quality of software deliverables while minimis-
ing software project risks and reducing total cost of ownership through
a combination of process improvement, test automation and “right-shore”
service delivery approach.
Testing services are delivered by a global SQA practice and amalgamate
over 15 years of experience accumulated on a multitude of software devel-
opment and testing projects, expertise in developing bespoke testing tools,
best practices and thought leadership refined through active participation
in International Software Testing Qualifications Board (ITSQB) and other
industry-wide forums.
Exigen Services follows value-driven governance model principles and em-
ploys rigorous, 5 phase approach delivering testing services:
Ź Discovery: During the Discovery Phase Exigen Services collects key
facts and readily available metrics data about the testing processes, envi-
ronments, tools used by the client. The results of this phase serve as a founda-
tion for tailoring our testing services to deliver maximum value in the shortest
period of time to the client.
Ź Assessment: During this phase Exigen Services works together with
the Client to define required testing process changes, key performance
indicators, SLA, success criteria and ROI estimate. The assessment phase
delivers clearly defined roadmap for testing process improvement com-
plete with the timeline for delivering cost savings and other business ben-
efits to the Client organisation.
Ź Initiation: During the Initiation Phase Exigen Services introduces nec-
essary testing process changes to the client organisation, deploys tools
required, performs transfer of subject matter expertise, training and es-
tablishes value governance mechanisms. At the end of the initiation phase
both Client and Exigen Services are ready to implement testing services
improvements.
Ź Transition: During this phase Exigen Services starts delivering re-
quested testing services using newly defined process model. The transi-
tion phase enables both the Client and Exigen Services to validate the as-
sumptions made during the assessment phase and make adjustment
to the process if required. The transition phase considered completed
when the process is operating smoothly and relevant success criteria has
been met.
Ź Acceleration: The acceleration phase covers continuous operation of
the testing services managed by the value-governance framework. Exigen
Services measures the performance of the services delivered against the
key performance indicators and SLA as well as implements incremental
process improvements to maximise the value delivered to the client and to
adapt to changes in business requirements and priorities.
This unique approach benefits our clients by building a clear decision-
making framework that provides in-depth long-term alignment with the
supplier, assures the business value of the services delivered and sup-
plies best industry practices to the client organisation.
02
TOOLS AND TECHNOLOGY
EXPERTISE
Ŷ HP Quality Center
Ŷ Microsoft Application Center
Test
Ŷ In-house bespoke test-manage-
ment tools
TEST AUTOMATION TOOLS
Ŷ HP QuickTest Professional
Ŷ Segue SilkTest
Ŷ IBM Rational Robot
Ŷ Selenium
Ŷ AutomatedQA TestComplete
Ŷ Compuware TestPartner
PERFORMANCE AND STABILITY
TEST TOOLS
Ŷ HP LoadRunner
Ŷ Grinder
SECURITY TESTING TOOLS
Ŷ HP Application Security Center
Ŷ Fortify
Ŷ Web Scarab
Exigen Services capability to supply both software development and test-
ing services enables us to effectively share subject matter expertise
on the project and as result deliver much higher levels of productiv-
ity in both areas. Due to this and combined with round-the-clock working
model through our presence through out North America, Europe and Asia
as well as labour pool elasticity to address peaks in testing workload Exi-
gen Services consistently deliver against compressed project schedules
and provides Clients with lower cost and better time-to-market for their
projects.
Our extensive capabilities and expertise, focus on working in close align-
ment with the client to deliver tangible business results supported by a proven
track record of successful projects was recognised by Brown and Wilson’s
Black Book of Outsourcing who rated Exigen Services as the No. 1 out-
sourcing vendor for software testing and quality assurance in 2008.
TESTING SERVICES
Exigen Services recognises that most clients face unique challenges in their
software development projects and offers testing services which are spe-
cifically tailored to meet those challenges and achieve business goals re-
quired by the client. Those services combine number of testing functions
including:
Ź software testing process improvement,
Ź test case design,
Ź test data management,
Ź manual test execution,
Ź test automation,
Ź legacy code rejuvenation,
Ź performance and load testing,
Ź security testing
Ź as well as many others.
Some of those functions are outlined below.
Comprehensive reporting is provided during the course of the testing ac-
tivities and upon the completion of each test run giving our clients real-
time insight into the progress of the project and quality of the software
artefacts under test.
Test progress report includes current status of testing effort against the
plan milestones down to individual tasks and test cases, variety of quality
and performance metrics including defect density, code coverage and test
success rates, prioritised list of outstanding issues blocking further prog-
ress.
The final test report provides quality metrics and other related information
of the release package, including test scope, tested environments, sum-
mary of bugs and issues still open, failed or test not attempted.
TEST AUTOMATION SERVICES
Test automation is essential in assuring the long-term project success. As software
projects mature the cost of regression and system testing is often becom-
ing the primary cost driver for any functional changes and improvements. 03
CASE STUDY
Ŷ Objectives
Automate regression testing
process of a SAP based billing
systems for one of the major
UK utility companies to reduce
release costs and minimise
software change risks
Ŷ Scope
Designing automated test sce-
narios, implementing automa-
tion system and integration
tests, implementing automated
test status reporting. preparing
test data, managing test envi-
ronment, ongoing test automa-
tion improvements.
Ŷ Project size and duration
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automation specialists
ǩPRQWK
Ŷ Results
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a clear and reliable “Go/No Go”
recommendation for releasing
into production
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Unless there is a robust test automation framework in place the Client will
end up with the significant amount of code debt often failing to realise full
return on the initial investment made in the software project.
Test automation services supplied by Exigen Services include the devel-
opment of initial test automation harness, test execution and ongoing
maintenance of the test harness. Those services provide our Clients with
a cost-effective solution to deliver test automation as an integral part
of the software project deliverables. Automation covers repetitive testing
and reporting activities freeing test engineers on higher value and higher
complexity tasks such as verifying software defects reported in production,
designing test cases for new functionality, etc.
Developing and maintaining test automation harness can be a significant
effort in itself. If left unchecked this effort can be comparable or event ex-
ceed the effort required to deliver the actual software. Exigen Services ap-
proach to test automation is based on determining the optimal level of au-
tomated test coverage for the software project and selecting a combination
of automation technologies that would deliver desired level of coverage
within set cost constrains.
MANUAL TESTING SERVICES
Manual testing complements test automation covering areas which are not
cost effective to automate. It also used for software projects with high rate
and scope of changes and when the project is considered a one-off effort
without any need for future enhancements or maintenance.
Services provided by us include exploratory, functional, system, smoke,
acceptance, configuration, regression and other more specialised testing
activities. Test are executed according to well defined test plans and test
cases.
Maintaining the effectiveness of manual testing as measured by defect
containment ratio and test success rate metrics is an essential element
of the service. Exigen Services testing team continuously monitors those
metrics and re-factors manual test cases and test plans to ensure the metrics
stay within required boundaries.
PERFORMANCE AND LOAD TESTING SERVICES
Application performance and stability characteristics are the critical suc-
cess factor for almost any software project. Although number of empirical
performance modelling methodologies exists they are inherently complex
and could be difficult to apply on real-life software projects to provide reli-
able results before the deliverables are functionally complete. Thus intro-
ducing the performance and stability testing early in the software develop-
ment project allows identifying any bottlenecks while the cost of change
is low and ensures the project will be delivered on time and on budget.
Performance and load testing services provided by Exigen Services include
the development of the performance test harness, test execution and main-
taing the performance tests in lock-step with application functionality. In ad-
dition to providing comprehensive reporting on the application performance
to the development team and other stakeholders our test engineers bring
wast amount of performance engineering experience to the project team.
04
If required they can provide an extensive advice on how to overcome per-
formance and stability bottlenecks identified in the application with mini-
mal impact on the code already developed.

Performance testing requires comprehensive software tools and consid-

erable hardware and network resources. The associated costs are often
disproportionate when taken in the context of a single software project.
As part of performance and load testing services Exigen Services provides
the use of our in-house fully equipped performance lab allowing to simu-
late significant load volumes, specific load patterns, network topologies
and failure scenarios.

LEGACY REJUVENATION SERVICES

Legacy applications present a significant challenge to the IT organisation

due to high maintenance costs caused by historical code debt and drain of
application expertise over time. Wholesale replacement of legacy applica-
tions is often requires a fundamental changes in the application landscape
and depends on business knowledge no longer readily available in the Company.
Risk mitigation costs make legacy replacement prohibitively expensive.

Legacy rejuvenation services offered by Exigen Services allow Clients to sig-

nificantly reduce legacy maintenance costs and significantly reduce the risk
of legacy application transformation or replacement. This is achieved by in-
troducing high levels of the automated unit testing coverage to the existing
code base which enables to reduce the scope of code changes during
the maintenance process and protects against any regression issues in-
troduced to production.

The services includes detailed analysis of data flows and application code
base, analysis of historical and planned release activity as well as histori-
cal data on application downtime, defects and maintenance costs. Based
on this analysis Exigen Services team determines how application main-
tenance units must be defined and implements corresponding unit testing
code, reference data and coverage metrics.

SECURITY TESTING SERVICES

Security compliance is a compulsory part of the release criteria for both

internally and externally facing applications for the majority IT organisa-
tions. Security testing is a multi-dimensional concern requiring compre-
hensive expertise. Companies are challenge to both retain and effectively
utilise such expertise while supporting peak demands in security testing
created by application release schedules.

Exigen Services enables our clients to address both those challenges

by defining a security testing regime designed to meet Client’s security
policy requirements and by providing a flexible pool of highly qualified
security testing personnel. Our security testing services are based on a
combination of automated security scans using leading commercial and
open source tools and focused manual security code reviews of the critical
software components. The services include but not limited to security re-
quirements and threat analysis; establishing appropriate security design
guidelines; carrying out periodic security architecture, design and code
reviews and incorporating security testing into unit, regression and func-
tional testing activities.
05
METHODOLOGY OVERVIEW

Exigen Services testing methodology consists of well-defined phases,

tasks and deliverables and includes clear recommendations on how to tailor
those for specific Client requirements, environment and business priori-
ties. This methodology is an evolving system absorbing industry best prac-
tices as they develop over time and incorporating the experience and Client
feedback from the projects completed by us.

Our methodology that the Client will have clear understanding on what test-
ing tasks will be carried out and how. It includes definitions for all key
activities such as:

Ź designing test cases to maximise test success rate

Ź defining test sets for execution a specified testing type on a given build
or package,
Ź executing tests and report defects
Ź performing regression testing and verify high severity defect fixes,
Ź verifying lower priority defect fixes,
Ź generating test execution reports and collect test execution metrics,
as well as many others.

During the test design and review sessions Exigen Services specialists en-
sure 100% functional coverage and required levels of code coverage all. We
plan each test run to maximise test success rate, discover high severity
issues as early in the cycle as possible and reduce the duration of the test
cycle while reaching required levels of coverage.

Exigen Services uses clearly defined and agreed with the Client criteria to
assign defect severities and follows mutually agreed procedures reporting
the defects discovered and providing comprehensive information neces-
sary for defect resolution. This ensures there is no unnecessary commu-
nication round trips between development and testing personnel and en-
sures high productivity for both teams as well as enabling Exigen Services
to provide services in geographically distributed software development
environments and across multiple time zones.

This methodology has been successfully applied with variety of Agile (in-
cluding Test Driven Development (TDD), Scrum and the Dynamic Systems
Development Method (DSDM)), iterative and waterfall based software de-
velopment processes. During the assessment phase of an engagement
Exigen Services specialists define how the methodology would be tailored
to ensure smooth operation of the combined team while minimising dis-
ruption for the Client’s development organisation.

DATA PROTECTION AND CONFIDENTIALITY

At Exigen Service we understand the critical importance of ensuring data

security and confidentiality when working on Client project as well as legal
data protection requirements applicable in variety of jurisdictions our Cli-
ents are operating in.

The methodology stipulates that the sensitive client data must not be used
in testing services unless absolutely required. As a standard practice un-
less dedicated test data is provided by the Client we anonymise any Client
data used for testing and, if necessary, use “synthetic” test data generated
with the tools developed for this purpose in the course of the testing project.
06
When testing activities must be performed using real and sensitive data
this is done only by authorised personnel in secure Client environment
either via remote connectivity or through an on-site placement.

COLLABORATION WITH THE CLIENT

The success of the testing project often depends on the close collabora-
tion with the Client’s business users, development and operations teams.
Our approach is to assign qualified test engineers with the relevant busi-
ness domain expertise and involve them in the software development life
cycle as early as possible.

This approach ensures solid understanding of the business needs the proj-
ect is aimed to address and enables Exigen Services test engineers to de-
tect discrepancies between the stake holder expectations, specifications
and software behaviour early in the project cycle. As result this reduces
the cost of corrections required and improves the performance of com-
bined testing and development team.

Exigen Services test engineers actively communicate with the development

team and other project stakeholders while remaining independent qual-
ity assessors. The deliverables they provide are not limited to identifying
software defects and publishing test reports, but also include project level
(defect containment effectiveness, mean time to defect resolution, etc.),
product level (defect density, test automation coverage, etc.), root cause
analysis data, and other information that helps the development team
and other project stakeholders to maintain comprehensive and objective
understanding of the project status.

The methodology requires Exigen Services testing team to hold a project

retrospective review with all project stakeholders at the end of each test-
ing cycle. The retrospective review enables and encourages all project par-
ticipants to reflect on the project progress and identify actionable improve-
ment opportunities.

Close collaboration between the testing team and other project stakehold-
ers defined by Exigen Services methodology ensures that the testing team
is adding value to all project functions through out the course of the proj-
ect. This leads leads to the better cohesion between the teams and, by ex-
tend, to a higher productivity of the project team as a whole.

COLLABORATION WITH THE CLIENT

 ABOUT EXIGEN® SERVICES

Exigen Services is the leading application outsourcing services provider, com-

bining world class skills, recognized expertise in development methodologies,
and industry experience to reduce risks, lower costs and deliver results. Exi-
gen Services has pioneered a new approach to global application outsourcing,
Outsourcing 2.0, which includes commercial terms that optimize finan-
345 California Street, cial alignment between the client and vendor. As a result, Exigen Services
22nd Floor, San Francisco,
makes IT outsourcing a much easier and more beneficial undertaking for
CA 94104 USA
 global enterprises. Since 2000, Exigen Services has been the global lead-
er in the use of distributed Agile methods for rapid and precise systems
sales@exigenservices.com development throughout the banking, insurance, brokerage, healthcare,
Phone: +7 812 327 9900 telecommunications, government and media industries. Exigen Services
has achieved high honors in a variety of independent lists and rankings, in-
Anastasia Novoseltseva, cluding Brown & Wilson’s Black Book of Outsourcing in 2008, Global Ser-
marketing communications vices 100 in 2009, Global Outsourcing 100 in 2009 and Inc Magazine’s 2009
director, Exigen Services Inc5000. Exigen Services is also a top 10 provider of outsourced product
development. Clients range from mid-sized growth companies to Fortune
For information
on Exigen Services call your 500 organizations, and include Sun Microsystems, CSC, Universal Music
local worldwide sales, service Group, Standard & Poor’s, T-Mobile, Westpac Bank and many others.
and technical support offices:
www.ExigenServices.com For more information, visit www.exigenservices.com.

RANKINGS AND AWARDS

Ź Inc. 5000 Ranking 2009

Ź Global Services 100 2009
Ź Black Book of Outsourcing 2008: Software Testing and Quality Assur-
ance Services #1Global
Ź Outsourcing 100

www.ExigenServices.com
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by permission. Other product and company names listed may be trademarks or trade names of their respective compa-
nies. All of the specifications shown in this brochure are subject to change without notice. 08