Client
A leading U.S.-based educational testing and assessment services company
Goal
Switch from in-person to online testing
Tools and technologies
AWS Serverless, Dynamo DB, Node.js, Typescript, Java, Jenkins, and Angular


BUSINESS CHALLENGE
Our client, which provides educational testing and assessment services, faced an existential threat with the pandemic-era lockdowns and social distancing
requirements. The testing centers it operated at physical locations were unable to open, leaving thousands of students worldwide in a state of uncertainty.Â
Our client had to switch from in-person testing centers to a digital-first or online
testing solution almost overnight. To achieve that, it had to migrate rapidly from legacy systems to the cloud. It also needed to ensure the sanctity and accuracy of its tests while delivering a seamless digital experience to its customers. Other challenges included the ability to dynamically scale up or scale down capacity in response to demand, maintain acceptable service levels, and enable thousands of
expert test raters’ to access and evaluate tests.

SOLUTION
Iris Software stepped in to facilitate a strategic digital pivot in the business model to secure the company’s future. Modernization efforts that were underway at the company even before the pandemic were accelerated as a digital upgrade became imperative. We shifted the data stored on legacy infrastructure was to the cloud. Our team developed a new testing interface that would work overnight across devices, geographies, and different internet connections. Switching the testing operations to the cloud with scalable capacity could help manage the surge in the number of users for the tests Iris also deployed automation and AI tools to deliver superior experiences for test raters. Those who faced challenges while attempting to grade tests were provided with an always-on AI-based solution to automate the troubleshooting and ticketing process.

OUTCOMES
The client now has scalable, digital-first testing capabilities to meet all its testing requirements.
- Cloud-based testing ensures that students, evaluators, and employees have access on-demand.
- The remote testing options are accurate, secure and safe from external threats.
- A strong focus on automation and user experience has allowed for optimized online offerings.
- Surges in demand for tests can be met rapidly and at scale with minimal intervention.
- Thanks to the always-on cloud offerings, service levels are easily maintained.
- The successful digital pivot has led to strong interest in a hybrid operating model to safeguard the business from threats in the future.
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Client
A leading securities trading firm.
Goal
Build a cloud-based automation framework to test client’s trading platform.
Tools and technologies
C#, Ranorex, TestRail, Simulators and Selenium.

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BUSINESS CHALLENGE
The client had a legacy trading platform that had a stack of 33 applications built on various technologies and architectures. Testing new features and additions was a challenge. A simple change in one feature would warrant verification of the entire application.
Extensive regression testing and verification were needed to ensure that changes in one feature do not affect functionality elsewhere. This was a cumbersome process with some 30,000 test cases being checked and executed manually by more than 20 people. The client also had multiple squads working on different apps and functionalities that it was a challenge to ensure that changes made by one squad did not impact the overall functionality of the platform. The brief for Iris was to design and deploy a common cloud-based test automation framework to enable faster launch of new features.

SOLUTION
Using its cloud-based ready-to-deploy test automation framework, Iris sped up deployment of new features. The Amazon Web Services based solution featured continuous testing of products on a common framework layer. It enabled capacity planning of spinned cloud instances and need-based shutdowns.
Iris executed the project using acceptance test driven development (ATDD), a methodology that involves collaboration between customers, business and development teams. What was unique about the approach? Typically, automation is introduced towards the end of a development cycle. In most projects, developers bring in automation in Sprint 4 for features developed in Sprint 1, 2 and 3. As a result, return on investment isn’t maximized. Iris introduced ‘in-sprint’ automation, enabling 90% test automation with every sprint. This resulted in more efficient testing and cost savings.

OUTCOMES
The new ability for complete capacity planning through the use of infrastructure-as-code for spinning up cloud instances helped the client achieve end-to-end automation of regression/ functional test cases. The specific gains for the client were as follows:
- 90% faster execution in each sprint cycle
- 80% faster script development
- 100% configurable for on-demand execution on AWS
- 70% reduction in cloud infrastructure
Company
