Test environments
When sizing a project, it is important to consider the system requirements for the test environments. Here we describe some common test environments that are used:
| Component test environment: This is often the development system and is the focus of this chapter. In larger projects, we recommend that development teams have a dedicated test environment to be used as a sandbox to integrate the components of the team members, before putting the code into the application build. |
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| Build verification test environment: This test environment is used to test the application produced from a controlled build. For example, a controlled build should have source control, build scripts, and packaging scripts for the application. The build verification team runs a subset of tests, often known as regression tests, to verify basic functionality of the system that is representative to a wider scale of testing. |
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| System test environment: This test environment is used for FVT and SVT to verify the functionality of the application and integrate it with other components. There can be many test environments with teams of people focused on different aspects of the system. |
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| Staging environment: The staging environment is critical for all sizes of organizations. Prior to deploying the application to production, the staging environment is used to simulate the production environment. This environment can be used to perform customer acceptance tests. |
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| Production environment: This is the live runtime environment that customers will use to access the e-commerce Web site. In some cases, customer acceptance testing might be performed on the production environment. Ultimately, the customers test the application. You must have a process to track customer problems and to implement fixes to the application within this environment. |
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