New release introduces Silk Central Connect solution to enable web application testing across a variety of desktop and mobile browsers

25 February, New Delhi India, 2014: Innovations across browsers, tablets and mobile devices have left organizations with the daunting challenge of testing across innumerable device and browser combinations to find both functional and performance issues in their production Web applications. With so many different configurations and platform releases to test, it is no surprise that this effort takes added time and cost to overcome. To help companies get back in-sync with the business needs and speed product delivery, Borland, a Micro Focus company (LSE: MCRO.L), today announced significant updates to the Borland Silk Portfolio – a comprehensive set of test automation tools for cloud, web and mobile platforms so organizations can now test any application across any end user configuration faster and easier than ever.

The new release also introduces Silk Central Connect, a cross browser testing tool that helps customers solve the challenge of supporting an almost endless variety of browsers and mobile browsers. It provides a virtual execution and configuration environment that can reduce testing time and effort by up to 80%.

“Customers need easy to use tools that do everything from reducing cross browser testing time, to automating manual test processes and ensuring peak performance across all application types,” said Archie Roboostoff, Borland Solutions Portfolio Director at Micro Focus. “The Silk Portfolio of testing solutions brings all of that together, streamlining testing across desktop, web and mobile.”

Working with existing development and testing frameworks, the Silk product family delivers more capabilities to make it easier for customers to transition from traditional application environments into more fast paced and agile web and mobile web environments. It reduces time and cost through an innovative virtualized and cloud based infrastructure that brings professional test environments within reach of smaller development teams, and removes the requirement to provision additional costly hardware to complete testing cycles. The end result is a dramatically lowered effort and cost of adopting automation in both agile and traditional development teams.

The Silk family of products are seamlessly integrated to deliver additional benefits to users. The new release brings Silk Performer and Silk Test even closer together, enabling customers to leverage their existing script investment to jump start their performance testing initiatives. Customers that already have working Silk Test scripts will find it much easier to get up and running with Silk Performer. Silk Central Connect is embedded in the new update of Silk Central to allow for a seamless upgrade without the need for extra software. Silk Test has also been integrated with Silk Central Connect to harness the power of the cloud to do fast and easy cross browser testing.

Specific Silk Portfolio updates include:

• • Silk Central Connect – New cloud based cross browser testing tool for web applications on a variety of browsers, without the need to buy expensive hardware. Borland provides Amazon images with various versions of Firefox, Chrome and Internet Explorer, which can be integrated into Silk Central Connect to quickly test across all browser types with the click of a button. To give a quick and easy view across the multitude of test results, Silk Central Connect delivers a side-by-side result comparison that ensures applications look and feel as they should across popular browser combinations. It allows customers to embrace HTML5, web and mobile developments and quickly test across a variety of platforms.

• Silk Central – Test management for agile and traditional development projects that eliminates the need to work from out of date spread sheets and documents. Silk Central gives a unified control and view of all testing activities across the organization, regardless of tool or technology used. Updates include improved usability, an ability to import requirements from Excel to improve requirements validation and improved decision support via reporting that can be shared across groups and users.

• • Silk Test – Powerful test automation that delivers cross browser and cross platform testing designed to be used by a wide variety of users without any coding. For those that prefer to write code and work in the IDE, Silk Test integrates with different IDEs including Microsoft Visual Studio and Eclipse. Updates include improved precision and speed and mobile browser support, which enables customers to use existing desktop browser scripts and run them on Android mobile devices without the need to create additional scripts. Record and replay has been made easy against any application, including mobile browser recording and configuration testing in the cloud, which eases the burden of setting up different configurations.

• • Silk Performer & Silk Performer Cloudburst – Easy and cost effective performance and load testing for web 2.0, enterprise and mobile applications. Execute peak load tests in the cloud with Silk Performer CloudBurst without investing in hardware and infrastructure costs.  Updates include an ability to use Silk Performer CloudBurst on internal web applications and enhanced reporting that enables customers to capture all raw measure data of a load test for full results analysis flexibility. This release also extends support for asynchronous web communication to ensure even the most advanced Web applications perform under heavy load.

• • Silk Mobile – Functional testing of mobile devices across all platforms. Plug in and go, no jail breaking, just install on your PC and plug in any mobile device for automated testing. All the benefits of test automation are now delivered to native mobile applications with Silk Mobile.

• • Silk WebMeter – Advanced website performance tool that tests websites globally. Free to use, lightweight and easy to use, it sends alerts when web applications are slow and non-responsive and leverages Borland’s global network of servers and agents to ensure applications run 24×7.

“Our aim is to deliver a portfolio of quality products that truly offer a ‘better together’ end user experience,” added Roboostoff.  “Our integrated software quality suite ensures everyone is on the same page during the software delivery and quality process.  The end result is improved collaboration, better products, faster release cycles, lowered development costs and dramatically increased end user satisfaction.”

The Silk Portfolio end-to-end solution helps development organizations manage the uncertainties and risk brought about by new technology platforms and multiple devices, networks and operating systems, ensuring quality throughout the software development lifecycle.

To find out more about the Borland Silk product set visit: http://www.borland.com/connect.

About Borland

Originating in 1983, Borland Software Corporation is a world-class provider of requirements, test and change management solutions. As part of Micro Focus Ltd, a member of the FTSE 250, Borland offers tools that are open, agile and work across the entire Application Development Lifecycle to enable customers to build better software, faster. For additional information please visit www.borland.com

The post Borland Updates Silk Portfolio – Delivering Test Automation that Embraces Latest HTML5, Web, Mobile and Cloud Developments appeared first on Core Sector Communique.

New virtual currency helps organizations to cut the cost and complexity of application performance testing

Mumbai, India, 12December 2013: Online Shopping Festivals and Christmas-themed marketing campaigns have given a major boost to online shopping in India in recent times. With website traffic peaks expected during this season,businesses need to guarantee their mobile and web applications will perform well under pressure and handle the upcoming onslaught of  online shoppers.According to comScore, among the BRIC Nations, India has been the fastest growing market adding over 18 million internet users and growing at an annual rate of 41%. Riding on a 31% year-on-year increase, India’s online population grew to 73.9 million. With an extended online universe in excess of 145 million the market is at a tipping point for online businesses. The study says about 60% Internet users in India visit online retail websites – and to retain them, businesses need to ensure they have a smooth experience.

In response, Borland, a Micro Focus company (LSE: MCRO.L), has launched Borland Credits – a new virtual currency that can be used to purchase Silk Performer CloudBurst testing services. The pre-paid model delivers application performance testing without the need for hardware assets, helping users to significantly reduce testing costs and complexity, quickly and efficiently.

A testing situation    

According to global research, conducted by Vanson Bourne and commissioned by Borland,44% of CIOs are aware of the events that drive peak-traffic loads, but do not simulate website performance with heavy load testing to see if they can handle the increased pressure on their websites.  That’s despite knowing that even minor delays to website response times can have a sizable impact on customer satisfaction, page views, conversion rates and site abandonment.

Commenting on the challenge, Nitin Dang, Country General Manager, India at Micro Focus, said: “There is no denying the significance and prominance of a business’ online presence, especially in today’s economic environment.Even the most usable website or mobile application can be rendered useless if the backend infrastructure can’t handle the volume of traffic during peak times. Borland Credits is a wonderful initiative to tap the potential of the cloud and offer businesses a flexible way to future proof their websites”

 “With the on going online shopping festivals as well as Christmas holidays being just around the corner, businesses need absolute confidence that their high-quality applications will perform well under pressure and handle peak loads.  However, managing and emulating hundreds of thousands of realistic end-users, from multiple regions, in order to load testan application can be time-consuming, complex and costly.  It’s enough to deter many businesses from testing in the first instanceadded Nitin Dang.

“We’ve created Borland Credits to offer businesses a forward-thinking and flexible way in which to get more from the cloud,” continued Nitin Dang. “Users will have easy access to our Silk Performer CloudBurst testing services – from anywhere in the world – without the need for unnecessary,costly infrastructure, which often sits around collecting virtual dust until it is needed.  We’re givingour customers better control over their testing expenditure, with the ability to ensure their applications run at optimum levels, wherever they may be.”

Users can choose between several packages, depending on how many Borland Credits are purchased in one go, without being locked into to a specific subscription plan or paying any service fees:

• Cloud infrastructure: Rent unlimited cloud infrastructure by the hour, to execute a load test.

Unlimited virtual end-user licenses: Users can pay per virtual end-user within a 24-hour period, depending on the application type under test.

• Spanning test periods:Purchase a 24-hour testing period model, which enables a load test to be tailored, run, analyzed and re-run multiple times without an additional charge.

Before any load test is conducted, Silk Performer CloudBurstwill display an estimate of how many Borland Credits will be used and on completion of a test, will calculate the number of Borland Credits to debit from the account to help users budget accordingly.

Through the new billing model and Borland Credit system users will also be notified by email, 24-hours in advance of when a load test agent is about to automatically close and will receive Virtual User Price Protection, so that if an application doesn’t scale to meet the loads anticipated, they will only pay for what they have used.

Borland Credits can be purchased via the Silk Performer Cloud Portal or a Borland sales representative.

For further information on Borland Credits, please visit:www.borland.com/cloudburst.

About Borland

Originating in 1983, Borland Software Corporation is a world-class provider of requirements, test and change management solutions. As part of Micro Focus Ltd, a member of the FTSE 250, Borland offers tools that are open, agile and work across the entire Application Development Lifecycle to enable customers to build better software, faster. Visit www.borland.com.

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