FAQs
Take a look at the PathCheck website, to get a basic overview of our GPS solution, which consists of a Mobile App (iOS or Android), and a Web Applicaton for Contact Tracers.
https://pathcheck.org/en/technology/gps-digital-contact-tracing-solution/
GPS Function End to End - Basic Intro Video
Testers can focus on the Mobile App (Android or iOS), or the Safe Places Web App, but most testers will need to be at least somewhat familiar with the whole solution. You can find details of the end to end solution here: How to Test GPS End to End
Yes! We have several Test Automation projects ongoing:
Mobile App test automation using 21labs, Eggplant, Appium, SauceLabs and BrowserStack
Safe Places Front End test automation using Selenium
Safe Places Back End test automation using Postman
If you want to focus on Test Automation, please reach out to Diarmid Mackenzie or Stella Nelson and he’ll connect you with the right team.
You can download the latest production release of the Mobile App in the App Store / Play Store. Search for “PathCheck”.
However, for testing, we also have pre-production builds of the App. What you need depends on what you are testing.
If you are testing on a Cloud device (e.g. emulator or Perfecto), you probably want an IPA or APK file which you can find in #mobile-gps-releases slack channel
If you are testing on a physical iOS device, you’ll need to be added to our TestFlight account. Jonathon Wright can set you up here. This will give you access to Beta builds, usually a few weeks before they are published in the App Store.
If you are testing on a physical Android device, we recommend you sideload APK files. We do have a Google Beta program, but it tends not to give you much control over exactly what version you are running.
How to sideload an APK: https://www.howtogeek.com/313433/how-to-sideload-apps-on-android/
Details of all the latest builds, APK & IPA files, and what builds you will find on TestFlight Beta, can be found in the #mobile-gps-releases public slack channel.
For more information on how to enable and use Feature Flags..
If you want to get more data in the app follow this guide which also tells you how to use feature flag within the app: Getting 14d of data onto a phone (or into Safe Places)
For most testing, use the Staging instance of Safe Places https://staging.spl.extremesolution.com/trace
Login details can be found in a pinned post in the #safeplaces_testing slack channel. That is a private channel, so ask Diarmid Mackenzie on slack to add you to it.
Our primary communication tools are:
Slack for general day-to-day communications.
You should have received an invitation to Slack as part of onboarding.
If you aren’t already in Slack, please join and join at leas the #testing channel.
Confluence (where you are now) as a repository for long-lasting content
Jira to track feature development, related testing, and bugs.
Yes, we are in the process of revising this schedule now - expect an update soon.
There’s 3 key sets of testing activity:
Retests for bug fixes
New test activity for new features or functionality
Regression testing, ahead of production releases
Exploratory testing
For new testers to the project, and for inexperienced testers, bugs retest, exploratory & regression testing are the most accessible test activities.
There’s usually a steady stream of bugs available for retest, available in Jira - see: Flows for Testing Work in Jira
Regression testing for new releases happens periodically, but we aim for a new release every Thursday.
For most testing, you will need to get familiar with how to set the Mobile App up to work in a pre-production environment.
This video shows how to do this, and also illustrates a few other useful tools for testing.
PathCheck GPS + Safe Places + Feature Flags + Test Tools Video
It’s about 30 mins long, but should give you a good basic orientation on how to set up for a variety of different test scenarios.
There are lots of different options in terms of test devices. If you want to use your own smartphone, you are very welcome to do so, and lots of testers have tested successfully on their own devices.
But we also have access to a wide range of mobile devices (iOS and Android) in Perfecto’s Mobile Cloud, which can also be used for testing.
Perfecto.io - Remote Mobile Testing (Automated & Manual)
We are also investigating getting access to Browser Stack and Sauce Labs, to provide further options for Mobile Device testing.
If you don’t have experience as a Mobile application tester, you can certainly still contribute to the project.
One option is to focus on Safe Places (the Web Application for Contact Tracers)
The other is to take this opportunity to learn about Mobile Application testing. We have several testers on the project who had no prior Mobile Application testing experience, but have made valuable contributions as Mobile App testers. A lot of the testing principles you already know are broadly applicable to Mobile Apps, and you can always reach out to other testers on the project, who will be happy to help you out in planning & executing your testing.
We are in the middle of a pandemic, and we don’t want anybody to take unnecessary risks in terms of travel outside their homes.
There have been some aspects of location-based function where it has been valuable to have testers who were able to travel around outside their homes, carrying a physical smartphone with them, but this has been a very small part of our overall test effort.
If you are able to safely leave your home, there may be some testing you can take on for which this would be useful. But if you can’t, it’s not going to limit your ability to contribute to the project as a tester.
We have a large Confluence space covering testing information & resources. Have a look through there and see if you can find an answer (there is a search box in the top right).
https://pathcheck.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/TEST
(unfortunately, a few resources are getting a bit outdated now: we try to keep them up-to-date, but we may have missed something - if you find outdated information, please help to get it up to date, either by fixing it yourself if you can, or by flagging it with someone else who can fix it).
Alternatively, ask a question on #testing on slack, and someone should be able to get you going in the right direction.