Reliability testing (RT)
 Testing the consistency & stability of the application over a period of time is k.a., RT.

RT should be done only for window OR standalone OR Desktop applications. It is not performed for web applications.


It is done to make sure the window applications uses/consumes the client hardware resources effectively.

It is possible that using the window applications (EX: Eclipse, Photoshop, adobe pdf etc) over a period of time viz., 72 OR 92 OR 120 hours, might create a huge backup files (Ex: temporary files, cookies etc). If it exceeds the limit, your client machine (Operating System) can hang due to out of memory problems.


As part of RT we test that the window application:
 - should create only min backup files
 - should reuse the files which are created already
 - should not create unnecessary files
 - should use min client resources.
 - The application should continue to work normally



Q: How to perform RT?
Ans: 
1. Take 10-15 system OR end-to-end test cases which are having core business scenarios.
2. Take any automation tools which are used for window applications viz., UFT, Test Complete, AutoIT, Sikuli etc & automate all the above test cases
3. Run the test cases continuosly over a period of time viz., 72 OR 92 OR 120 hours uninterrupted. During testing analyse the local resource consumption parameters as per the requirements.

