Development of test automation framework for testing avionics systems

This paper discusses the development of a reusable and customizable test automation framework for testing of avionics systems at the system, integration and unit testing phases of the V-model system development life cycle. The increased system complexity and involvement of multiple streams of engineering (electrical, mechanical, software etc) has resulted in Co-design of hardware and software, hence leading to many interim releases of system and necessity to re-execute the tests. The increased complexity of software in current avionics systems also demands a data driven test strategy and automated test environment where multiple tests can be executed with same test logic but with different set of values (for exercising MC/DC, robustness test cases and Boundary Value Analysis etc). This paper explains the methodology adopted at Goodrich Sensors and Integrated Systems to achieve the objective of developing a reusable and customizable test automation framework by using an open source unit testing tool and designing a customizable test environment with capability of re-executing the tests with ease of clicks of mouse buttons. This test automation framework also provides capabilities for Data Driven Tests hence eliminating the need for writing and maintaining multiple test scripts, resulting in increased productivity. This technique has definite advantages in reducing the cost by providing repeatable and re-executable tests and reconfigurable test environments. This has also resulted in increased efficiency of the test team by providing data driven test strategy where multiple program platforms can be tested using the same test suite with minimal adjustments on data sets as per requirements.