Tricentis Testim Salesforce: Accelerate quality with no-code testing

The need for no-code Salesforce testing

As Salesforce expands its no-code capabilities, users transform into no-code developers as they create complex workflows using tools such as Lightning Web Pages and Salesforce Flow. As is the case with coded changes, these no-code changes impact and potentially introduce risk into critical processes. Thorough testing is needed to ensure changes align with business requirements and maintain system reliability.

Traditionally, Salesforce testing requires scripting, inaccessible to developers without coding expertise. Advances in no-code test automation have introduced “clicks, not code” testing, enabling robust testing of complex capabilities without coding. This shift empowers a greater number of Salesforce users to implement testing best practices and fosters collaboration across roles, from unit testing to end-to-end testing.

What is needed for Salesforce development is a DevOps model that integrates testing of both coded and no-code development as part of a streamlined, efficient process that produces quality and value for Salesforce stakeholders.

No-code testing strategies

Salesforce promotes no-code application customizations due to their fast development, ease of reuse of existing components, and ability to be implemented directly by business users. These customizations can be simply creating new custom fields or objects, creating a custom interface with Lightning App Builder with a custom layout and components, or a custom workflow with Salesforce Flow.

Figure 1: Lightning App builder

As no-code development grows, teams need an accompanying no-code testing approach for several reasons. First, as users without coding experience become no-code developers, they need an approachable technique to ensure application quality that does not rely on coding. Second, no-code approaches make it easier and faster to develop in Salesforce. Without equally fast (or faster) testing, quality will quickly suffer or become a bottleneck to releasing an update. It is for these reasons that no-code development needs no-code testing.

Any software test strategy, whether coded or no-code, initially directs efforts at producing focused, small component tests early in the development lifecycle. These tests provide specific and immediate feedback for individual components and are needed before any broader, integrated testing of the application or environment. Some of these components may be complex, such as CPQ (Quote Line Editor) pricing and product rules, conditional fields, or even Salesforce Flows.

Relying on manual testing or scripting to test these components is time consuming and tedious, often resulting in incomplete coverage and reduced quality. However, no-code testing using pre-built test elements abstracts the test implementation details and provides a simpler, faster, and reusable testing approach that can accompany the no-code development.

Figure 2: Salesforce testing hierarchy

Integration testing covers interdependencies between Salesforce organizations, connected components within a Salesforce organization, installed packages, or external services. Integration tests need to be included in the CI/CD pipeline as a quality gate when promoting changes to components or connectivity to the integration environment. This integration testing is often used as part of a nightly regression suite. Incorporating no-code testing (along with API testing) as part of an integration test suite makes it easier and faster to ensure the quality of connected Salesforce components.

End-to-end / system testing includes larger tests for complete workflows, such as a complete lead-to-cash workflow. These tests are longer, more complex, and fragile. Each component of the end-to-end workflow must work for the test to be successful. A good testing strategy is to minimize the number of these tests, keeping them to the most critical workflows. System testing should be done prior to every production release at a minimum, either in the CI/CD pipeline as a gate for promotion to the UAT/staging environment or as part of the regression suite.

Low-code test authoring

Manual testing can be slow, incomplete, and requires the efforts of a focused team of manual testers. As Salesforce customizations accumulate, test automation ensures that testing capacity and quality scales. Test automation provides no-code test authoring able to quickly produce tests for common Salesforce elements. For more complex or irregular component customizations, scripting may be used as part of a low-code testing approach to provide additional flexibility when needed.

No-code testing using pre-built steps (examples)

As mentioned earlier, no-code development needs no-code testing. Salesforce test automation solutions need to have built-in functionality that simplifies the process of testing complex Salesforce components. These pre-built test steps shown below make it possible to configure and reuse testing without the need for code.

Salesforce Flow: As the process automation tool for Salesforce, users optimize their business workflows using Salesforce Flows. These Flows are often complex with many logical branches. This no-code, pre-built step makes it possible to test all logical branches and ensure that these critical business processes continue to work as expected.

Figure 3: Pre-built step – Salesforce Flow

Document validation: Many Salesforce workflows produce a quotation or purchase order. The document validation step ensures values within PDF or Microsoft documents, such as key-value pairs (e.g., “Tel:” and number) or cells within a table, are correct, all without code.

Figure 4: Pre-built step – Document validation

CPQ Quote Line Editor: Exhaustively testing all combinations of product and pricing rules in CPQ is a lengthy and complex task. This no-code step simplifies this task and continuously tests the adherence to business-critical rules.

Figure 5: Pre-built step – CPQ Quote Line Editor

Tricentis Testim Salesforce: AI-powered, codeless Salesforce testing

Testim Salesforce makes testing Salesforce environments faster and easier without the need to code.

Testim Salesforce provides:

• Pre-built test steps to simplify and speed up testing of common Salesforce components
• No-code, recorder-based test authoring to build tests as you click through your application
• Reduced maintenance using locators built upon Salesforce metadata
• Reduced risk through no-code testing of permissions and access controls

Optimized for Lightning

Salesforce Lightning is dynamic and always changing with pop-ups and notifications appearing at any time. Testim Salesforce provides stable testing for Salesforce Lightning. Where these unpredictable changes often result in fragile tests that are a maintenance burden, Testim Salesforce makes testing simpler and more reliable.

Ready for the next Salesforce release

Salesforce releases occur three times a year, with a limited four-week pre-release window to test against before going live. Instead of spending valuable time fixing tests, Testim Salesforce works with the latest release. Your customizations will continue to work with the Salesforce release, and you can spend precious time testing Salesforce workflows, not updating tests.

Simplifying testing for a more stable environment

Testim Salesforce provides the no-code testing that is needed for no-code Salesforce development. Whether component testing, integration testing, or end-to-end system testing, Testim Salesforce accelerates and simplifies testing and eliminates extensive coding as a requirement for Salesforce environment quality.

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