Science and Technology

A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF QUALITY ATTRIBUTES IN MOBILE APPS

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What is Mobile Apps?

Mobile development refers to the creation of apps to be used on devices like tablets, smartphones, automobiles and watches. Mobile development typically joins options of mobile devices that will not be available on desktop devices. Associate degree example of this is often the flexibility to control a tool or play a game just by moving the smartphone around in space. Another well-liked example is that the improved reality game Pokémon Go. Mobile apps are designed and built for different operating systems. The Android operating system is the most popular followed by Apple’s IOS.

Mobile Development is one of the most interesting areas of software development. The mobile development represents a good innovative opportunity for most of the programmers. A software developer who lacks the knowledge of building web or desktop application by themselves can build mobile application more easily now as it is expected to be the small and singular purpose. Even an old gaming application developed with huge code can be simpler to transform into a mobile application. Retro-style games from an 8-bit & 16-bit era that are not accepted much by users can be widely recognized as a mobile application on other platforms like a mobile or tablet. Possibly, mobile development is the future of software development. As mobile devices are becoming an important part of daily life activities, so the need for mobile development is increasing. It represents more than just an opportunity for a solo-developer to develop their project. Mobile development involves developing applications for phones, sensible devices, sensible watches and alternative sensible devices which run mobile operating systems. Mobile development is not only about developing mobile applications, but rather includes how an application is accessed and used on a mobile device. Majority of the applications are developed completely for mobile devices but fully as a web application. This can set a new trend in future as mobile devices become more and more powerful, and the browser plays an even more dominant role as an operating system of future. Mobile development isn’t just about building phone apps, although that is certainly a large part of it. Mobile development is doing any kind of development for any kind of mobile device. What I mean by this statement is that mobile development incorporates developing apps for phones, tablets, sensible watches, and all other kinds of wearable devices which run some kind of mobile operating system. It also doesn’t necessarily mean developing purely mobile applications, since even web developers today have to think about how their applications are going to be used and accessed on a mobile device.

Objective;

 A comprehensive study is necessary for the researchers to find out the mechanisms where they achieved the quality attributes. While using comprehensive study, we will evaluate and compare the existing automated testing tools of mobile applications for different quality attributes. The objective of automating software testing is to reduce the testing effort, time and cost. Testing automation results is improved in efficiency, whereas decrease in human involvement is testing process. We found that there is a limitation on the number of tools that test the extensibility as well as the performance and scalability for apps under Windows OS. We may extend our work for more automated testing tools and for more quality assurance factors.

Quality Attributes:

Quality Attributes & its Description
ReliabilityReliability is the degree of consistency of a measure.
AccuracyIs trying to find if the software meets the requirement specification to prove that software is behaving as expected.
Validityvalidity determined using intraclass correlation co-efficient was reported to be moderate
Mode based testing(MBT)Model-based testing (MBT) is a popular approach for test automation.
UsabilityUsability is the ability of user to easily interact with the system using the user interface.
EffectivenessTime to read the scenarios and to begin performing tasks
Evolutionary TestingEvolutionary testing requires the execution of a large number of tests.
Android TestingUser-interface driven system testing of these devices is gaining popularity, with each vendor releasing some automation tool(s)
Web TestingWeb testing is the name given to software testing that focuses on web applications.
Platform maintainabilityMaintainability is ability to make change for error corrections, supported by defined interfaces, documentations, comments in code
Intrinsic ProblemTo sum up, the intrinsic problem of Kano’s wording can defined as the ambiguity of The five alternatives and paired questions.
Extrinsic ProblemThe extrinsic problem of Kano’s wording can be defined as the indiscriminate use of modified versions without providing a comparative analysis.
MaintenanceMaintenance phase deals with fixing the issues that were fronted by the mobile users
Usability guidelinesUsability has been identified as one of the main issues that should be further investigated as regards PHR adoption and use
EfficiencyEfficiency is “a set of attributes that bear on the relationship between the level of performance of the software
FunctionalityFunctionality is “a set of attributes that bear on the existence of a set of functions and their specified properties.

RESULT & DISCUSSION:

In mobile development no specific platform do exist that provide quality attributes to be considered in mobile applications. No platforms do exist where we can find out the mechanisms to achieve the quality attributes in mobile apps. We have required a comprehensive study that can provide such platforms. We have determined developer performance problems and analyze the best approach use to solve these problems. Mobile development is one of the most interesting area of software development. It gives a unique opportunity for a developer to build an actual, usable, meaningful application in a relatively short period of time. In the past few years, numbers of attributes are used for different platforms. But the performances of these attributes are not high on every platform. These attributes are worked by using different testing tools. These tools have been evaluated for their features, platforms, code coverage and efficiency. However, they have not been evaluated and compared to each other for different quality attributes. The attributes are exists in different platforms such as Android, IOS, and Windows. To address these problems find out some tools or models are used and which tools or models are best for these problems.

In current research, we have calculated the developer’s performance problems in mobile development organizations through a critical review. First of all we defined the some attributes to enhance the developer performance in mobile development. The attributes are maintainability, reliability, extensibility, Usability, accuracy, validity, effectiveness, efficiency, reusability, availability, scalability, complexity, accessibility, portability, correctness, security and testability. Usability is the ability of user to easily interact with the system using the user interface, accuracy is trying to find if the software meets the requirement specification, validity determined using interclass correlation co-efficient was reported to be moderate, effectiveness is time to read the scenarios and to begin performing tasks, efficiency is Users’ achieve certain goals and the resources expended in achieving them, With reusability, SPAG-C reduces the testing time from days to hours for heterogeneous devices, in availability Being released as a mobile application will allow it to be available almost 100% of the time, scalability is ability to respond in an acceptable time, Complexity is the state of having many different parts connected to each other in a complicated way, accessibility is a structured source code and error free programs, portability is efficiently used the scientific application, in correctness application should be correct in terms of its functionality, or security should be sufficient to prevent unauthorized access to system functions, and in testability System should be easy to test and find defects.

By following developer performance factors, the challenges should be addressed: increase happiness among developer because happy software developers solve problems better. The challenges that exist in mobile development are code\computation offloading, task-oriented mobile services, elasticity and scalability, security, cloud service pricing, technology impact, wireless network, and device heterogeneity. These challenges are discussed for building the next generation MCC applications, provide a survey of existing solutions in the literature, identify research gaps, and suggest future research directions for building MCC applications.

Leading to these challenges some techniques or approaches are used. They used the testing tools and different models for comprehensive study of quality attribute. The testing tools or models that are used are: ANOVA, AMOGA, Evaluation Methods, empirical study, LASSO, evodroid, MobiGUITAR, WATIR, Selenium, Apache Cordova, B–W approach, PACMAD, SDLC, SLR, MBT, JPF, A DOCTOR, PRISM, monkey, RepoVis, RANOREX, and Mobile test Approach. These tools models or approaches are very important for mobile developers to develop quality attributes in different platforms. These techniques are also helpful for developers to enhance quality attributes in better ways. The model based approach aim to support designers and developers to focus on the main aspects of application design. The mobile developers are used these approach to design an application. Another beneficial approach for mobile developers is mobile test approach in which Mobile Test Environment Semantic Tree (MTEST) is used to assist engineers to perform test modeling and analysis for mobile test environments.

Ultimately, through a critical analysis of techniques identify the best method provide the solutions of these factors of mobile developers. The attributes that used in different platforms may be same but the workings of those attributes are different for each platform. An application developed on Symbian OS, will not function on iPhone’s IOS. In a similar manner, an application based on iPhone’s IOS, will not work on Android platform. The attributes maintainability and extensibility are used in android IOS and windows but the working of these attributes are different in each platform. Android and windows mostly have attributes are same but the working is totally different. A very few attributes that are same for android IOS and windows but the working are different. The usability is used in android IOS and windows but they have its in working in every platform. The reusability and scalability are used in android and IOS but not exist in windows. Availability and capability also exist in android and IOS but not exist in windows. Like this many attributes have same platforms but there working are different from each other. After the reviewing of different models approaches or testing tool we have recommended the privacy models that can provide the privacy. PRISM is a beneficial model for mobile developers to enhance quality attributes in different platforms. . PRISM gives an idea how to accelerate development and relieve developers. For mobile developers we have recommended a testing tool MBT. This tool is helpful for mobile developers to create a platform for comprehensive study.  “Model Based Testing” aims to automate as much work as possible by automatically generating test cases and verifying the GUI state. While using recommended tool and model the researchers could do automated testing tools that have not been evaluated and compared for different quality attributes.

Recommendations:

Mobile development refers to the creation of apps for use on devices such as tablets, smartphones, and automobiles. Mobile development is not only about developing mobile applications, but rather includes how an application is accessed and used on a mobile device. During mobile development organizations face different types of challenges. We have provide insights for the enabling technologies and challenges that lie ahead to move forward from mobile computing to mobile cloud computing for building the next generation mobile cloud applications. The challenges that exist are code\computation offloading, task-oriented mobile services, elasticity and scalability, security, cloud service pricing, technology impact, wireless network, and device heterogeneity. Different attributes used to enhance the mobile developer performance are: extensibility, maintainability, reliability, usability, reusability, complexity, accuracy, security, availability, scalability, correctness and testability. Under the attributes we have conducted analysis, in which we have found the best model for developer problems. We used different testing tools and models for comprehensive study of quality attributes. Researchers used PRISM model that gives an idea how to accelerate development and relieve developers. We have also recommend a tool MBT that’s aim to automate as much work as possible by automatically generating test cases and verifying the GUI state. These model and tool are very helpful for mobile developer to enhance quality attributes and also create a platform for comprehensive study.

In further work the researcher could focus on more advance quality attributes for different platforms and also they could focus on such platform where they easily find out the mechanisms to achieve the quality attributes in mobile applications. The researchers should be focus on existing automated testing tools of mobile applications that have not been evaluated and compared for different quality attributes. As future work, we may extend our work for more automated testing tools and for more quality assurance factors. The next steps for our research are a deeper investigation on the core quality attributes and on methods for measuring those under the requirements imposed by mobile web development.

After the reviewing of different models approaches or testing tool we have recommended the privacy models that can provide the privacy. PRISM is a beneficial model for mobile developers to enhance quality attributes in different platforms. . PRISM gives an idea how to accelerate development and relieve developers. For mobile developers we have recommended a testing tool MBT. This tool is helpful for mobile developers to create a platform for comprehensive study.  “Model Based Testing” aims to automate as much work as possible by automatically generating test cases and verifying the GUI state

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  1. Pingback: 16 Best Software Development Blogs - Fajar Magazine

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