Should Automation that runs slower than human test execution speed - be dumped?

I am working on a piece of automation using java and some commercial tool to drive a test scenario on AN iPad App. This scenario involved entering multiple pages of information and hundreds of fields of data. This automation script runs this scenario for say 1 hr where as a tester that exercises same scenario on the app “manually” - claims that it takes only about 30 minutes.

I was asked – if automation script runs slower than human test execution (however dumb) – what is the use of this automation?  What do you think? 

Here are my ideas around this situation/challenge:

Mobile Automation might not ALWAYS run faster than human test execution -

Many of us in IT, have this QTP-Winrunner way of seeing testing as bunch of keyboard strokes and mouse clicks and automation is a film that runs like a dream at super fast speed.  GUI automation tools that drive Windows desktop application GUI or Web GUI have consistently demonstrated that it is always possible to run sequence of keyboard and mouse click events at higher speed than human.  Enter mobile world – we have 3-4 dominant platforms – Andriod, iOS, Blackberry and Windows Mobile. GUI Automation when enters the world of mobile – mainly runs on some windows desktop that communicates with app (native or web) on the phone that is connected to the desktop through, say USB port.  The familiar paradigm of all automation and AUT running on the same machine/hardware breaks down and so would be our expectations on speed of test execution. iOS platform specifically (in non-jail broken mode) presents several challenges for automation tool while android is programmer friendly. As technology around automation tools on mobile devices and associated platforms (desktop and mobile), evolves – we need to be willing to let go some of our strongly held beliefs of GUI automation that happens on web and windows desktop applications.

Man vs. Machine – items that might make machine/program slow

When you see a button on the screen – you know it is there and you touch it (similar to click on non touch phones) – as a human tester you can regulate the speed of your response depending upon how app is responding. Thus, sync with app, checking if the right object is the view and operate the object – all of this happens very natural to human. When it comes to automation tools (mobile tools especially) – all of this has to be programmatically controlled. We would have function calls like “WaitForObject” and some “Wait” calls to sync the speed of automation with speed of app responses. The whole programmatic control of slowing down or speeding up of the automation in relation with app response and checks to make sure automation does not throw exceptions – many times automation programmers need to favor robust but slower automation code that is almost guaranteed to run against all app speeds. This is one of several reasons why automation might run slower than human execution. You might ask how do likes of QTP handle this situation – even tools like of QTP need to deal with these issues. Given the state of technology – the problem is somewhat acute in mobile automation space.

Imagine long, large and highly repeated testing cycles – a human tester would lose out on 2^nd or 3^rd iteration due to fatigue and boredom. Consider current case of multipage and entering 100’s fields – how long do you think a human tester can focus on doing the data entry.  Here is where our “tortoise” (slow but steady) automation still adds value. This slow program does not mind working 100 times over and again with different data combinations – frees up human tester time and effort for you.

Remember – automation and skilled human tester both have their inherent positives and shortcomings. A clever test strategy would combine (mix and match) human and automation modes of exercising tests to get maximum output – information about issues, bugs and how value of the product be threatened.

Also note - A good manual test cannot be automated – if you claim that you could automated one,then it could not have been a  good manual test.

If automation runs unattended well – why bother about execution time?

Many of us are used to sitting for hours staring at automation running to see if it works, pass or fails. If fails – check, correct and rerun. If automation is robust and runs unattended – why have someone looking at screen – watching automation running. Why not run it at non working hours? Why not schedule it to run at certain time. This will free up human resources that can be deployed at other areas requiring focused human testing. Isn’t this a value provided by a slow running automation – free up human testers? A well designed but slow running automation can still justify investment as it can run without bothering you.

How you can get best out of slow running automation?

• Optimize automation to see if speed can be improved – remove sync/waits, “object exists” checks (not compromising on robustness of automation)
• Identify bottlenecks in tool and fix them
• Identify environmental and data related slowness in automation and fix them
• Schedule automation at non working hours and save human effort

Have you come across automation that runs slower than human test execution speed? What did you do with automation? Dumped it? Want to hear about your experiences