UAT and SIT testing are the two different levels of testing in the application testing phase of QA. UAT stands for User Acceptance Testing and SIT stands for System Integration Testing. Here we compare UAT vs. SIT against one another.
UAT: User Acceptance Testing Best Practices
User Acceptance Testing is the final stage of testing before the system is accepted by the operational user. End users perform UAT based on the user requirements specifications to confirm whether an application is meeting requirements.
Types of UAT Testing:
There are two major types of UAT Testing: Alpha Testing and Beta Testing.
- Alpha Testing: Alpha testing is performed at the developer’s site by the customer. This type of UAT testing is performed under a developer’s control. Alpha Testing is performed once the system testing is completed.
- Beta Testing: Beta testing is performed at one or more customer sites by the end-user of the software. For the beta testing of an application, it is given to a trusted customer. Here this type of UAT testing is not under the developer’s control. Beta testing is performed only after alpha testing is done.
SIT: SIT Testing Best Practices
SIT Testing is performed to confirm whether the modules tested individually can work together to deliver the required functionality. Modules tested individually may work fine, but when they are integrated some issues may occur. SIT testing is performed to test the dependency between modules through the transfer of data from one module to another.
System integration starts at the module level where units are integrated to form a subsystem and eventually a system.
Types of SIT:
There are two major approaches to System Integration Testing: the top-down integration approach and the bottom-up integration approach.
- Top-down Integration Approach: Here modules are integrated by moving downwards in a hierarchy, where the main module is at the top. In a top-down approach if lower modules are not ready a dummy module called a stub is used for testing. A stub acts as the module during the test. Stubs have the minimum functionality required to be used while testing the ‘above’ module.
- Bottom-up Integration Approach: Here modules are combined and started to test at a very low level. If the top-level modules are not ready then drivers are used for testing. A driver is a program specially used for testing.
Comparison between UAT vs. SIT:
No. | SIT- System Integration Testing | UAT- User Acceptance Testing |
1 | The testing interface between modules | Testing concerning user requirements |
2 | The purpose of testing is to see the interface | The purpose is to test the functionality from the end user’s point of view. |
3 | Performed by Developers and Testers. | Performed by Customers and End Users. |
4 | Issues will be with data flow and control flow. | Not as per User Requirements. |
User acceptance (UAT) testing best practices and systems integrated (SIT) testing best practices are both critical skills for any quality assurance team. At tCognition, we pride ourselves on our QA team.
35 Responses
Comments navigation
May I request that you elaborate on that? Your posts have been extremely helpful to me. Thank you!
Thanks for the help
Thank you for writing the article. I like the topic too.
What is the difference between testing integrations or “interfaces” when the testing occurs after the developer build out whatever they were assigned. Let’s take an ETL, Developer “develops” it and hands it over to QA after Unit testing positive and negative tests. It then moves into QA where QA runs their test cases and will create bugs which are quickly turned around by development. The data is validated in the Target system. Once QA signs off, usually a CR is created, a production CR is created, a CAB meeting takes place, and the CR gets sign off to be pushed released to the production environment. I am in a rather bizarre scenario where we had a development phase of the project, which included QA and testing, but the PM said that the integration was not complete yet because it has to go through SIT which is coming up. What is the point if QA already signed off and source and target were in production, but it has to go through this SIT when it was already gone through QA? What am I missing here?
Good one. Thanks for sharing
Comments navigation