How does your tool improve my life as someone in QA?
The Global App Testing (GAT) platform enables QA teams to scale up without increasing headcount, or changing current processes. We enable rapid on-demand QA to support shift left and DevOps. This enables companies to integrate manual testing earlier in their SDLC. Put simply, our technology platform places the best testers, on the right tests, in real time, anywhere in the world.
The On-Demand platform from GAT allows you to ‘Fire and Forget’. What this means is that you can very quickly and conveniently launch tests directly from the tools you are already using, such as Jira, GitHub, Slack or TestRail (with the option to also launch tests from within the platform itself, if preferred). Once launched, you can continue with other tasks and start receiving the results within an hour.
GAT is now available on the Atlassian Marketplace and GitHub Actions Marketplace, making it easy for QA engineers and the like to test and build on the go.
What misconceptions are there around your tool?
Many have the view that we are an automation tool, and it’s easy to understand why. Whilst the process of launching a test is automated (just a click of a button from the commonly-used industry tools mentioned above) and has the feel, and speed, of running an automated test, our tests are run on real devices in real environments.
Another common misconception is that we use device farms. We pride ourselves on using a community of vetted testers.
What tool feature are you most proud of?
It has to be giving users the option to launch tests and receive results in real-time within some of the most commonly used tools (incl Jira & GitHub).
What is your roadmap and how do you decide what to prioritize?
There are lots of very exciting projects in the pipeline which we would love to share! Without giving too much of the game away, we are looking at some great new features that will further enhance the user experience. These include becoming an integration-first platform with an open API (including a deeper dive into the Microsoft ecosystem), to ensure that testing with GAT is as easy, and convenient as possible. We are also working on adding more advanced targeting and configurability testing - all of which we can’t wait to share with you!
In terms of prioritizing, we are constantly listening to our users, gathering feedback and monitoring demand across the industry. This allows us to identify and prioritize key areas in which to focus on.
How do you involve your customers in your tool development process?
Our product team works very closely with our users and very much has an always-on approach that allows for continuous discovery. This includes prototyping, feedback sessions, focus groups and so on. We also encourage all areas of the business to report any feedback, no matter how large or small.
How do you test your own tool?
We adopt a mix of automated test scripts and exploratory testing with our own crowd.
What is the most under-appreciated feature of your tool?
This would probably be the ability to launch a test and receive results within Slack.
Users are also enjoying how the On-Demand platform allows them to share the responsibility of QA with other teams, and prove the value of quality to the business as a whole. Test results can be accessed and presented to suit more audiences in their companies. For example, more senior stakeholders may not be as familiar with Jira, but have the option to now view results in another channel, eg via the intuitive On-Demand GAT platform, or Slack.
How do you support your customers when releasing tool updates?
New product releases are shared via a multitude of channels to make sure our users are aware of, and can easily work with, any new tools being released. Support is offered with training materials,(demo tutorials and pdfs), and from our Customer Success team.
What type of support is given when purchasing your tool?
Our On-Demand platform will have self-onboarding so that users can very quickly and easily start testing right away.
However, ensuring a high level of service is of the utmost importance to us so support and guidance will always be available from our QA Solutions experts, Customer Success and product teams, as and when it is needed.
How would you like to keep the conversation going with the Ministry of Testing community in the long term?
Maintaining a good relationship with the community is important to us. We want to share our enjoyment and passion about QA. Whether it’s reaching out and introducing any exciting new products and releases that provide time-saving solutions to the community, or just generally having a chat about any news or trends and learning from one another.
