App testing prior to beta release

[kgwhite]

Mobile app development is something new for me. I'm curious as to how others are doing app design/prototype testing prior to official beta release. My experience with business apps has always involved groups including domain experts for design, prototyping , alpha testing. However my Android work is independent and unsupported. I'm building a reusable database back end that can support generalized catalog or list front end patterns.

A couple of questions:

• Are you enlisting users for prototyping?
• Are you doing pre-beta testing with external testers?
• Are you creating reusable application level functionality using classes?

I know this sounds a little stuffy. Maybe especially to games developers where everything is unique. Just trying to come to terms with rapid development practices for mobile or tablets.

 

[AllyAndroid]

Having spent a few years in our IS&S department as an application analyst, I tend to spend too much time testing my apps before I release them to the market. If I make the smallest change, I load the app on multiple devices and test the change on each device. Currently, I have four devices: LG Ally, Droid 4, Droid Razr HD, and Nexus 7. If it doesn't crash on any of those, I consider the change completed and go onto the next change. Once all changes have been tested and pass, I upload the app to the market. But unlike IS&S, my Android apps are all solo. I am the developer, alpha tester, beta tester, and end user. I don't enlist any users or have external testers.

For reusability, I created a template that contains all the libraries and coding that I use in most of my apps. When I want to create a new app, I just copy the template folder with all the files in it to a new folder and rename the project. Open it up and change a few variables and the app layout and basic functions are all ready to go. This allows all my apps to have the same look and feel. If a certain function, like licensing, is not needed. I either comment it out or delete it from the new app. The template is a work in progress and I am always finding new things to add to it.

 

[kgwhite]

Thanks for the reply.

You to have a very reasonable approach for reuse. One of the things I miss with B4A is all classes and dlls created over the years with Visual Studio. They provide stable functional blocks that just need to be wired up. I'll have to build up a template similar to what you use.

Not sure about testing across multiple devices. I have a Droid 2 phone, Samsung Galaxy 3.6 Player, Galaxy Tab 2, and Nook HD+. The Nook a bit of an oddball so it might not be very useful for testing. I don't have anything with the latest OS.

It's a refreshing new world.