SAP S/4HANA Cloud upgrade… Is regression testing needed? What do I need to test? And how?

The next SAP S/4HANA Cloud upgrade is coming up (or just happened ?), and you might think “do I really need to test a cloud software?”

SAP is putting huge efforts in delivering superior quality with every release. Nevertheless, as a customer, you need to ensure that your business processes are still running smoothly, also after the upgrade.

Therefore, the clear answer to the question if testing is needed is: yes, you must perform testing after each release upgrade!

In my first blog, I explained how SAP helps you doing software testing in SAP S/4HANA Cloud. In this blog, I want to focus on testing after the upgrade – often referred to as “regression testing.” This blog is mainly about how to…

… define the testing needs during regression testing.

The need and effort for testing is defined by:

1. Which business processes are already running?
2. To which extent can I leverage automated testing?
3. Which changes come with the release upgrade (or a scope extension)?

1. Which business processes are running in my system?

At the time of regression testing, you typically have a set of existing testing scenarios in place. Typically, they are be based on the SAP Best Practices processes which you have implemented, plus a possible additional backlog that you defined during your Fit-to-Standard workshop (look for your Confirmed backlog list).

2. To which extent can I leverage automated testing?

You should leverage automated testing as far as possible! It will ease, and speed up the quarterly regression testing. And – the test automation tool for S/4HANA Cloud is integral part of the S/4HANA Cloud quality system.
Here are the steps to identify if automatable test scripts (“test automats”) are available in test automation tool for S/4HANA Cloud for your business processes:

• Identify available test automats for your business processes via SAP_Best_Practices_Test_Automation_Index in SAP Roadmap Viewer.
• Define what shall be tested with test automation tool, and what shall be tested manually. Test scripts for manual tests can be found in SAP Best Practices Explorer for each business process
• Via the “Manage Your Test Processes” app in SAP S/4HANA Cloud – is the process flow of the test automat fitting to your implementation? Does it need to be adapted?

3. Which changes come with the release upgrade?

Release change information are available in three main sources:

• An overview of release dependent changes in SAP Best Practices processes are available in the “What´s new viewer” in the help portal .
• An overview of the release dependent changes in (manual) test script documents that are available for every SAP Best Practices process in SAP Best Practices Explorer is available in the SAP Roadmap Viewer (task: Regression Testing). It displays the information if a process step in a test script and documents what was changed, added, deleted, moved, or is unchanged. This is of special relevance, if you have the need to do manual testing.
• An overview of release dependent changes in test automation tool for SAP S/4HANA Cloud, including detailed change information for the standard test automats (“What´s New” document within Jam Group (request access via mail to: saps4hanacloudtesttool@sap.com).

I hope this blog gave an overview on how to find out what needs to be tested. My next blog will explain the first steps to use the Test Automation Tool for SAP S/4HANA Cloud.