UFT or Unified Functional Testing is an Automation Software Testing Tool developed by Mercury Interactive (QTP). This tool was developed in the 1990s and in May 1998 the first version was available. Later this was acquired by Hewlett Packard (HP) and later in turn acquired back by Micro Focus. UFT is a record-and-playback tool where basically all the steps are recorded and then played back. UFT is primarily used to automate functional and regression testing.

>>> Listen to our podcast on Automating Functional Testing and Regression Testing with UFT. <<<

What are the main functionalities of UFT?

• Behind UFT is a keyword-driven framework that, by using VBScript, allows tests to be automated. This is an advantage over most Freeware tools.
• In addition, report creation and integration capabilities with other tools (defect tracking, Test Management tools) is a big plus.
• The support for different platforms such as online, desktop and mobile is a big plus.
• The ability to leverage technologies such as Java, .NET, SAP and Oracle is very convenient.

What are UFT’s strengths?

• It is based on a Framework so no programming experience is needed
• Robustness and experience. UFT has been around for a while and suffers little from “Flakiness” so the tests run stably.
• Great comunity . Because UFT has been on the market for a long time, there are many users and thus a large community that share knowledge, experience and solutions.

Points of interest

• UFT is paying and fairly expensive. UFT is sold in packages of licenses (Seat or Concurrent), but offers good ROI if applied correctly
• UFT runs only on a Windows environment and provides support for Edge, Firefox and Chrome
• If you want to create better, flexible tests you should use VBScript. This of course requires some technical knowledge, but is equally a challenge to gain knowledge of scripting that will expand your possibilities much more.

Take aways

• Record -and-play automation tool with a robust framework
• Large community
• Not only for website testing, but also for desktop application testing

>>> Listen to our podcast on Automating Functional Testing and Regression Testing with UFT. <<<