Test Bed & Test Harness

[judhajit]

How is Test Bed and Test harness different from one another?

[sridharrganesan]

A testbed is a platform for experimentation of large development projects. Testbeds allow for rigorous, transparent and replicable testing.In general, the hardware and software requirements are known as the test bed. This is also known as the test environment. Testbeds are also pages on the internet where the public is given the opportunity to test CSS or HTML they have created and are wanting to see the outcome.

Test harness is a collection of software and test data configured to test a program unit by running it under varying conditions and monitor its behavior and outputs. It has two main parts: the test execution engine and the test script repository. Test harness is also called as automated test framework

Test harness allow for the automation of tests. They can call functions with supplied parameters and compare the results to the desired value. The test harness is a hook to the developed code, which can be tested using an automation framework.

The typical objectives of a test harness is to:
- Automate the testing process.
- Execute test suites of test cases.
- Generate associated test reports.

A test harness typically provides the following benefits:
- Increased productivity due to automation of the testing process.
- Increased probability that regression testing will occur.
- Increased quality of software components and application.