What are the advantages and drawbacks of QTP?

Though the quick test professional is quite useful like every other object in this world, it has got its advantages and drawbacks. The same thing is going to be discussed here in this article. 

Advantages of Quick Test Professional

1. The quick test professional has got such simplicity that it can be understood easily by even a non programmer and can begin with the testing by adding the test cases.

2. The quick test professional provides support for record and playback of the scripts. Plus it comes with the ability to edit the scripts just after the recording is complete. Different recording modes or options are available with the quick test professional:

    a)   Normal or context sensitive recording mode

    b)   Analog recording mode and

    c)   Low level recording mode

3. Quick test professional (QTP) possesses an excellent object identification mechanism.

4. Quick test professional comes with an extended support for the following add ins:

    a)   SAP

    b)   Oracle

    c)   Java

    d)   .NET

    e)   Siebel

    f)    Main frame or terminal emulators

    g)   Web services

    h)   Web forms and so on.

5. With quick test professional the existing tests and test scripts can be enhanced even if the AUT or application under test in not there with the help of an active screen.

6. Almost all of the popular test automation frame works (such as key word driven, data driven, modular testing approach, hybrid and so on) are supported by the quick test professional.

7. An IDE or integrated development environment is inbuilt in to the quick test professional which is quite easy to use and has got a simple interface. 

8.The scripting language “VBScript” which is used by the quick test professional is just like English and can be learned easily. There are plenty of sources via which one can learn VBScript.

9. In many of the test automation suites it is found difficult to implant the MOM i.e., the Microsoft object model but in quick test professional it is an easy task to do.

10.To make quick test professional further better it can be embellished with other test management tools such as the HP QC or quality center, functional testing tools such as winrunner and test management tools such as test director and so on. Once the tests have been mapped to the automation scripts, they can be executed directly from the HP quality center. Also, winrunner test execution can be kicked off by the quick test professional.

11.With quick test professional several types of suites can be maintained namely:

    a)   Sanity

    b)   Smoke

    c)   Regression and so on.

12. Like most of the test automation suites it provides support for xml.

13. Excel or data base files can be used easily in quick test professional with a variety of methods to use them.

14. Data and the test iterations can be easily maintained.

15. Test reports provided by the quick test professional are complete with all details required for analysis.

Drawbacks of Quick Test Professional

1. Proves to be costlier than any other test automation suite in terms of license and maintenance.

2. It does not support multiple threads and instances execution.

3. It will be surprising to know that the quick test professional has got no high speed rather it has got much slower speed than most of the open source tools such as selenium.

4. Support is provided from HP QC only on the renewal of the license.

5. Add- ins (such as SAP, oracle, java, .net, Seibel, peoplesoft and so on) have to be purchased separately.