Systems Integration Checklist

Introduction

When you develop a new software product, integrating it into your existing systems is essential. By testing all the components and interfaces before the release, you’ll be able to avoid any post-launch bugs and glitches that could frustrate your customers or cost your company money. This checklist will help you plan a system integration test that’s complete and effective.

1. Identify the scope of your data
2. Define the scope of your test plan by identifying the system under test (SUT) and the system integration test environment (SITE)*. This will help you create a complete picture of how each component interacts with each other in order to determine if it’s working as intended or not.
3. Assign roles and responsibilities for each party involved in this process

*SITE – responsible for defining requirements and ensuring they meet requirements set forth by SUT

2. Establish your key objectives

Understand the business objectives for the initiative and what level of risk is acceptable for each objective. This can be done by prioritizing the following:

• Customer requests – How many customers are requesting this functionality? If there are none, it may not be worth doing; however, if there are many requests from high-value customers then this could be an important project to work on.
• Business value – What impact will this system have on your company’s bottom line? Will it increase revenues or decrease costs? Does it help you attract new clients or retain existing ones? If so, then those types of projects should take priority over others because they will likely provide greater returns on investment (ROI).
• Project schedule – How long do we have before our competitors launch similar products/services into market? If we don’t move fast enough now then our market share could decline dramatically over time due to lack luster offerings compared against competitors who have already invested heavily into developing similar products/services such as yours!

3. Assess your Test processes

Test procedures are the steps you will follow to test a specific requirement. A good test procedure includes:

• The purpose of the test. Why are we doing this? What does it mean for our system if this requirement is not fulfilled?
• The inputs and outputs for each step of your process. If one input is invalid, what happens next? How does it affect other parts of our system if there is an error in processing data at any point in time during our testing process (e.g., what happens if we enter an invalid date into our database)?

4. Identify your Data

Before you can begin to integrate your systems, you need to know what data is available and where it’s held. Data is the most important part of any system–it’s what makes it useful and relevant.

Data can be structured (in a database), unstructured (in a file), or semi-structured (on a website). It may also come in formats that are difficult for your organization to read or use effectively–for example, text files with columns separated by commas instead of tabs or spaces; images that have been saved as jpegs rather than tiffs; spreadsheets created using different versions of Excel…

5. Evaluate Data Integration Solutions

The best way to evaluate data integration solutions is by reviewing the following:

• What is a data integration solution?
• What are the main types of data integration solutions?
• How do they work, what are their advantages and disadvantages, and who uses them?
• How do you choose one over another if you have multiple options in mind?
• Key considerations when selecting an option (the technical side).

6. Set up a bug-tracking database before you begin testing so that you can log issues and monitor progress throughout the project.

• Set up a bug-tracking database before you begin testing so that you can log issues and monitor progress throughout the project.

A bug-tracking database is a program that allows you to track bugs in your software, including when they were reported, who reported them and how they were resolved (if at all). Bugs are often logged as “bugs” because they represent problems with the system or application being tested; however, not all bugs need to be fixed before releasing new versions of software–sometimes it’s just helpful for developers to know what needs fixing so they can prioritize their time accordingly.

A well-planned system integration test will improve your chances of a successful release and reduce costs in post-launch maintenance activities.

Testing can be done in phases, but it needs to be planned out before testing starts. It’s important that you define what each phase will accomplish, who is responsible for doing what, when they’re supposed to do it, etc. Test cases need to be defined as well so that you know what exactly you’re testing at any given time during your testing sessions.

Conclusion

Now that you’ve read through the checklist, we hope it gives you some direction on how to approach system integration testing from a test management perspective. Remember, this is not an exhaustive list of all the items that could be included in your testing plan but rather a starting point for planning and organizing your testing efforts. If there are additional items that apply specifically to your project or industry, then please add them as needed!