Explain Silk Test Architecture and limitations

Silk Test is a tool specifically designed for doing REGRESSION AND FUNCTIONALITY testing. It is developed by Segue Software Inc.
Silk Test is the industry's leading functional testing product for e-business applications, whether Window based, Web, Java, or traditional client/server-based. Silk Test also offers test planning, management, direct database access and validation, the flexible and robust 4Test scripting language, a built in recovery system for unattended testing, and the ability to test across multiple platforms, browsers and technologies.

The Silk products include

Sit Test for functional and regression testing
Silk Performer for load and performance simulation
Silk Pilot for functional and regression testing CORBA and EJB servers
Silk Radar for automated defet tracking
Silk Vision for enterprise application health monitoring
Silk Express for a scalability and load testing consulting solution.

The testing process has these 4 steps :

Creating a testplan (if you are using the testplan editor)
Recording a test frame.
Creating testcases
Running testcases and interpreting their results.

Creating a testplan

If the testplan editor is used, the automated testing process is started by creating a testplan. A basic testplan is structured as a hierarchical outline and contains:

A Test Plan
A Testplan is made up of a large amount of information, a structured, hierarchical outline provides an ideal model for organizing and developing the details of the plan. A testplan consists of two distinct parts

An outline that describes the test requirements
Statement that connect the outline to the 4Test scripts and testcases that implement the test requirements.

Run the Silk Test setup from the CD or through the Network.
The Silk Test Software is available in the Firesip\Europa\softare\siltest5.0.1\siltest� directory in your Network Neighborhood.
Get into the above folder and select the setup.exe file to start the installation.
During installation, it will ask for the licence file. Set the path Firesip\Europa\software\siltest 5.0.1\licence� for the licence.dat file.

Procedure To use the wizard :

1. Involve the wizard by selecting File /New and clicking the QuickStart Wizard icon. Now you will name a new testplan, which will organize and manage your tests.

2. Click Next.

3. Name the file edit.pln and Next. The next step is to record the test frame, which defines all the windows, dialogs, menus, and so on that you want to test.

4. To create a new test frame, leave New Test Frame selected and click Next. At this point, the wizard lists all the open (running and not minimized) applications. If Text Editor is not open, you can open it now (it is the directory where you installed Silk Test). After you open the Text Editor, click on the QuickStart Wizard title bar to see Text Editor added to the list of applications.

In Silktest,

Select the File -> New menu from the menu bar. (or) select from the 'white icon' in the left top corner of the window.
It will ask for various kind of files to open. Select the '4Test include file' to declare the window objects from the application.
The '4Test Script file' option is to open the script file where we will be writing testscript.
The above two files are more important for building the scripts.
Open the application you want to test. If you are going to test the Yahoo site, then open the browser load the page you want to start testing.

The basic silk scripts will be in two forms. One as an include file and the other as a script file.

The include file with the extention *.inc can be used for the declaration of window names, window objects, variables, constants, structures and classes. The core objects of the scripts lies here.

The script file will be used in writing scripts. It will be with the extention *.t. The body of the scripts will be defined here. ie. the testcases that meets various test conditions will be written in the script file.

Platform Independent


Silk Test doesn't care about how the application is created, in which software the application is written, what kind of design is used, which browser it is being worked, in which operating system the application is running. All that needs for an application to be tested using silktest is that it needs a frame (like window)

Browser Independent



There are various kinds of browsers used by various people for running their applications. The user may use any browser of his choice to test the standard application. Each and every browser acts differently with different applications. They show the same page differently. The web objects they display can also be aligned or displayed in different manner.