Installation Testing

April 14, 2010

Narasimha Reddy Vadde
Agenda
 Overview / Introduction
 Prolong
 Installation and uninstallation process notions
 Installer Types (Widespread types of installers)
 Types of Installation
 Installation Testing for Various Applications
 Installation Testing Modes
 OS Security Components
 Test Approach
Overview / Introduction
 Installation Testing is one of the most important part of testing activities.
“ Installation is the first interaction of user with our product and it is very important
to make sure that user do not have any trouble in installing the software. “
 It becomes even more critical now as we have different ways to distribute
the software. Instead of traditional method of distributing software in the
physical CD format, software can be installed from internet, from a
network location or even it can be pushed to the end user's machine.
Prolong
 General questions that arise
 Why is this type of testing required?
 Installation testing helps confirm that the right changes are going into the
correct folders.
◦ For example, A folder containing the HTML files and CSS files.
 Product delivering a new version with bug fixes has high possibility of code
change or modification.

 How do we test?
 Usually installation testing is done by SCM team by evaluating both old and
upgraded system.
◦ Folder level validation- All folders with the timestamps are checked.
◦ File size verification- All tested and compared with the earlier version.
 The other side- Black-Box Testing is different from the testing done by SCM
focals.
Installation and Uninstallation
 Installation and uninstallation process notions
 Software Installation / Installer is a program that performs certain actions for
software installation on a user computer such as:
 file copying to a destination folder on a hard disk;
 shortcuts creation;
 changes in the Registry;
 system files changing.
 Software uninstallation means deletion of all program parts from the system
(records in the Registry and in other system files, DLL libraries in the
WINDOWS/SYSTEM folder, etc.)
Installer Types and Factors
 Widespread Types of Installers:
 Windows: Windows Installer, InstallShield, Macrovision, InstallAnywhere, Wise,
 SetupBuilder, Actual Installer, Smart Install Maker
 Linux: apt, rpm, dpkg, portage.

 Factors affecting the Installer:

 The type if installation testing you do, will be affected by few factors like
 What platforms and operating systems you support?
 How will you distribute the software?
 Which all OS Security tools affects
Types of Installation
 Manual Installation is a case when the software installation is performed without the
installer help or requires considerable user participation.
 Automatic Installation is an installation that does not require any user actions except
its starting (password entering, license agreement acceptance, etc.).
 Self-Installation is a fully automatic installation that does not require an initial start of
the installation process.
 Silent Installation Messages and windows are not displayed during the installation of
this type.
 Remote Installation is a type of installation when the control is performed from the
remote computer that is connected via LAN or serial cable.
 Clear Installation is an installation that is performed in the absence of interfering
factors (files of the previous installation of this program, unstable OS mode, etc.).
Installation Testing for Various Applications
 While testing you should take account of specific installations of various
applications
 Program packages
 OS Dependent
 Standalone Application
 Antivirus software
 Drivers
 OS Support
 Applications Dependent
 Games
 Standalone
 Packaged  (2D & 3D)
 Mail clients
 POP, SMTP (configuration, Authentication & Access)

 The testing is carried out for each of the above installations specific to the OS
it supports
Installation Testing Modes
 Installation is often proposed with different testing modes to delete, update,
recover or modify the installed software.
 Uninstall (Remove) – deletion of a program.
 Repair – an application recovery if it was damaged.
 Modify (change) – change of installation options after its termination.
 Update – update the program version.
OS Security Components
 Following OS security components that affect the software installation
 Installation under different users
 Single User
 All Users (by default)
 User permissions
 Set of users with different user rights as - Write/Read permissions to the
machine/folders/directories
 DEP impact (Data Execution Prevention )
 DEP is a set of software and hardware techniques that allow to execute additional testing
of RAM contents and to prevent launching of a harmful code
 DEP allows blocking viruses and other malicious software that attempt executing their
code out of system memory space that is reserved for Windows and other authorized
programs.
 Remote installation and Firewall
 Programs that allow the installation from a single computer to all computers in the
network, domain, certain range of ip addresses
 UAC impact (User Account Control )
 Applicable in Windows Vista
 Test Approach
 Network: Clean state, Types, Network/Remote, Failure
 User Permissions: User Privileges, Read/Write access & Location
 Memory Checks: Less memory, incompatible OS, Disk Space calculation
 Install Modes: Repair, Reinstall, Upgrade & Multiple Installs
 Addition of files, registry entries, PATH vars & Shortcuts
 Installation with uninstallation => Returning to base system state
 File assoc, Disassoc, Data & Registry Removal
 Installation completion details in Readme, INI & Log files
 3rd party software requirements & components
 Existing and Dependent instances
 Different Domains and Time Zones
Thank ‘Q’