Borland released an upgraded version of Borland SilkTest, the enterprise-class functional testing product recently added to Borland's Application Lifecycle Management portfolio through the acquisition of Segue Software. SilkTest 8.0 offers new features designed to help organizations optimize the quality of software by streamlining and automating testing efforts. It also adds support for testing Eclipse-based applications and those applications running on the latest Internet browser and Microsoft .NET 2.0 environments.

SilkTest 8.0 provides a full-featured automated functional testing system designed to ensure software meets designated functionality, quality, and reliability requirements. Automated functional testing is a key component of any comprehensive software quality process, enabling enterprises to thoroughly verify application functionality with accuracy, comply with industry and company standards, and streamline this critical but time consuming process.  

SilkTest is a member of Borland's Silk quality and performance management product line, and will play a role in Borland's upcoming Lifecycle Quality Management solution, expected to be introduced later this year.  

"SilkTest provides a sophisticated system for test planning, development, execution and reporting across multiple platforms, development environments and browsers," said Erik Frieberg, vice president of product marketing and strategy at Borland. "Its tight integration with Borland's other test, performance management and requirements management products enables IT teams to improve quality throughout other phases of the development lifecycle. This lifecycle approach aids efforts such as requirements-driven testing and helps customers be more efficient in their existing development and testing processes."

SilkTest 8.0 adds support for testing Eclipse-based applications, supporting Eclipse 3.0 and 3.1. Customers using the standard Eclipse framework or the Eclipse Rich Client Platform can now leverage SilkTest's powerful quality assurance capabilities. In addition, SilkTest 8.0 includes new support for testing applications running in the Firefox 1.5 browser on Windows, as well as Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 and .NET 2.0.

"SilkTest 8.0 builds on the functions and features that make test automation manageable and maintainable," said Gary Shealy, Sr. Software Engineer,
Osisoft   a provider of real-time performance management software and SilkTest customer. "New capabilities that include .NET 2.0 support and easier class mapping are examples of the long standing tradition of outstanding support and advanced features that are the hallmark of SilkTest."

Integrated Test and Lifecycle Management Capabilities SilkTest 8.0 integrates seamlessly with other Borland Silk products such as Borland SilkCentralR Test Manager for more advanced, process-oriented test management, including requirements verification and validation, test execution scheduling and reporting capabilities. SilkCentral Test Manager helps to assess application readiness and speed delivery by providing an up-to-the-minute status on application quality via Web-based scheduling, execution, reporting and defect tracking. SilkTest also integrates with SilkCentral Issue Manager for workflow-oriented defect management.

The ability to define high-quality software requirements and connect them directly to testing needs is a challenge for most organizations. SilkTest customers using SilkCentral Test Manager can also leverage powerful integration with Borland CaliberRM(TM)   a complete requirements management system designed to facilitate collaboration, impact analysis, and communication in the definition and management of changing requirements.  

Additional features and benefits of SilkTest 8.0 include the following:
--Easy-to-Use Automated Testing -Provides a unified automation environment for test creation, test execution, and test maintenance so customers can build modular, reusable and highly maintainable test automation architectures.

--Continuous Productivity Improvement - Provides unique features for running automated tests, including an extensible out-of-the-box recovery system that allows tests to run unattended 24/7. Should an error occur, such as an application crash, the error is logged and the application is restored to its original base state, so subsequent tests can continue to run and produce valid test results.

--Flexible, Low Maintenance Testing - Offers a powerful GUI abstraction layer that maps the graphical elements of the application under test to their automatically constructed counterpart objects in SilkTest. This helps testers adapt to changes in an application even as they test it, resulting in robust, low-maintenance test scripts.

--Precise End-User Experience Simulation - Includes user simulation capabilities driving the application just as an end user would. This results in more thorough testing of the user experience.