What kind of testing is automation?
It must be fully understood from the beginning that test automation is not testing. It is software development! A script is a program that drives the system on the workstation to perform certain tasks. In some ways, an automated test is harder to design than a [regular] software program, because in addition to interacting with the operating system and current environment on the workstation, it must also interact with the Application Under Test (AUT.) The expectation must be that the AUT will not always operate correctly (or else why test?) Therefore, to be robust, extra programming must be performed on the script to allow for this uncertainty. As software development, as successful project must have all of the same characteristics as other SW projects.
