Samsugn Lab.dev

Samsung's Lab.dev is another cloud based mobile application testing service. This article is a summary of my experience with it specific to Android. The site also supports Windows Mobile, Java and bada testing.

What's great about it:)

- It's free!

What's not so great about it:(

- Limited functionality (no automated testing)
- Limited devices (only Samsung devices)
- Each session on a device is valid for a max of 30min.


For those of you who would like to try it out here's how..

Go to https://innovator.samsungmobile.com/mbr/individual.mbr.add.do and register a new account. Sign in with the new account you created. Select Android page (see screen shot below..)



Now select Lab.dev from left of the screen (see pic below..)



Now click the Android button (see pic..)



A requirements test will follow. If all requirements are met you can proceed to the lab screen where you can select the device you want from what is available (see screen..). One you've decided on a device select 'Start' to download the java web start app(.jnlp file) that will show you the running device (grant required permissions for the application to run on your pc).




You can test your android apps on the device by downloading the .apk files onto it over the internet.

More screenshots...

Perfecto! - Cloud mobile testing

Perfecto is the Spanish word for perfect. It is also the name of a cloud mobile testing service (http://www.perfectomobile.com). For an overview of how perfecto offers cloud mobile testing services please see their video(embeded below).



The perfecto website offers a 1 hour free trail for testing their service. This blogpost is an overview of my trial usage of perfecto.

Perfecto Free Trail Overview

For my trial experimenting I picked the Motorola Droid handset. We have one of these handsets at work. I picked this handset so I can rate my virtual testing experience against the real thing. Having completed my trial testing period I would say the virtual experience was quite realistic although it was a few seconds slower to touch and other event responses. Below are screenshots taken during the trail.





What I liked about perfecto:

- I could manipulate the virtual device much the same way as the real device. One functionality I couldn't trigger was the keypad open/close, but perhaps that functionality has been omitted from the trail version.

- Installing .apk files to the virtual device was a breeze.

- I could easily trigger incoming calls and sms on the virtual device(note: even though I refer to the perfecto device as 'virtual' it is in actuality a real device - refer video above). Triggering these actions on a real device would have been a little bit more cumbersome.

Perfecto does seem like a close to perfect solution for mobile testing on the cloud. However I was disappointed to find that the feature I was really looking forward to trying out; automation testing, was not available in the trial. If automated testing is as good as it appears in the video, then that would definitely make perfecto just perfect!:)