How to test on iPhone Simulator on cloud?

Testing of mobile applications need to be conducted on multiple mobile browsers as more people use mobile devices. It would be agonizingly slow to manually test your app on every mobile device and browser, which would not be able to keep pace with agile development. Testing by hand will only complicate the process of regularly releasing your apps. You can automate tests in order to make them run quickly on various iOS simulators.

Using Appium, the industry-standard open source framework, you can easily automate mobile tests for simulators and actual devices. Appium cloud lets you run your tests using the scripting language of your choice. If you are an iPhone tester, then this blog-post is for you!

Remember, it will not be possible for you to make a profit if you don’t do your mobile app testing well. You well get unfavorable app store ratings,  deletions, fewer downloads, and possibly lost revenue if you don’t. When you use an agile, online testing service to thoroughly test your iPhone app, you can increase the chances that you’ll release a bug-free app that’s also enjoyable for users.

While creating your mobile app and releasing new features and updates, your developers need to consider a number of factors, since users can download them on a variety of devices such as iPhones, iPads, and Android tablets. When taking into account factors like operating system, screen size, connectivity, and others, testing your mobile app can be expensive, time-consuming, and stressful.

iPhone simulators – what are they?

The iPhone simulator or an iOS App Simulator mimics the functionality of an iOS application. It allows you to launch and run iOS applications from your computer or web browser without the need for an iOS device.  There is a vast difference between a simulator and an emulator. Although they are frequently used interchangeably, they are in fact separate tools.

The purpose of simulators is to create an environment where the behavior and configurations of a real device can be replicated. The software and hardware features of the real device are duplicated in emulators. Although simulators simulate a virtual environment, they don’t follow all its rules. 

Simulators are often used as emulators, as well. However, this is not always the case. 

Users can test apps without an iOS device, or access iOS apps without an iOS device. Testers use iOS simulators primarily for development, while end users use them primarily for accessing apps. 

Developers who do not have a real iPhone for testing can use an app simulator as an alternative. It’s also possible for people to use an app simulator to access an iOS app from a Windows device, such as Facebook or Whatsapp.  

The benefits of iPhone/iOS simulators

Simulators for iOS apps have several advantages. Here are a few:

• Simulators are useful for debugging and testing iOS apps.
• Unlike running the full software, simulators mirror the software, so they run quickly.
• The majority of iOS developers and testers do not have access to all iOS devices using different screen sizes, resolutions, and older versions of iOS.
• It is possible to run iOS and Android apps without the need for hardware in some simulators.
• Code errors can be easily identified with simulators.
• Using an Android device, you can run iPhone and iPad apps.
• There are many open-source and free iOS simulators available.
• Early stages of development can be carried out using simulators connected to an IDE.

Simulator testing: what is it good for? 

The main difference between simulators and emulators is that simulators are for Apple devices, while emulators are for Android devices, meaning you cannot run Android apps through simulators. 

This means that simulators will replicate the required iOS and allow your app to run within a realistic environment such as iPhones and iPads. What simulators can do is mimic the internal behavior of an Apple device. While it is useful to test your app in the iOS environment of a given device, you will encounter some limitations when testing on real devices: 

• There are some simulators that do not expose all the functionality available in a target device, such as hardware sensors and cameras. 
• Real-world user conditions and hardware components cannot be tested by simulators. 

How to test on iPhone Simulator on cloud?

Cloud-based iOS simulators are the most convenient and straightforward method for running iPhone apps on Windows. As simulation resources are allocated appropriately when processing scales up or down, and the cloud-based simulator service provider takes care of the resource requirements for running applications. Moreover, the provider is responsible for maintaining and storing the application. A cloud simulator eliminates the need for carrying multiple iOS devices, configuring them, and maintaining them. The following tips will help you produce the most accurate report:

1. Install Apteligent SDK and initialize it 
2. In Xcode, click the play button in the upper left corner to run the app
3. Then close the application by clicking the stop button next to Run 
4.  A crash occurs when the application is launched
5. It is necessary to relaunch the app in order to report the crash (data is sent when the next app is loaded).
6. The battery level for simulators may not display under Crash Diagnostics, for example, when you check the portal under Live Stats.

Aside from test automation, LambdaTest is a cloud-based platform that lets you automate Selenium and Cypress tests and run live interactive tests using thousands of real devices and browsers, enabling you to test your applications for responsiveness and compatibility.

iOS Application Testing Checklist

Checklists for iOS mobile applications are specifically designed to test their characteristics. They do not test their functionality.

• Install the application within an acceptable amount of time. Check the installation time of the application.
• Now determine whether the app has a logo and a name, and determine whether they represent the application’s core purpose.
• Check whether the splash screen appears when you launch the application.
• A splash screen timeout and home screen loading time should be checked. If the application doesn’t load within an acceptable period of time, users may quit or even uninstall the application if the Home screen takes too long to load. Also, check how the Home screen displays the contents.
• It should be obvious from the start what the application does. It should speak for itself.
• The app should support both landscape and portrait orientations, if this is the case, check the app in each orientation. The user interface should then be adjusted accordingly.
• It is possible that the application may crash when you launch it or may display nothing while you are not connected to the internet. Test the application to see if it behaves as intended.
• You should check whether the application uses location services and whether a location permission alert is displayed. The user should only be prompted once for permission to use the location services.
• Check whether the application displays a push notification permission alert if it sends push notifications. This permission alert should also be displayed only once to the user.
• Check whether the app behaves as designed/desired after you launch, quit, and relaunch it
• If the app does not function as desired, close the app by pressing over the Home button of the device and reopen it.
• When the app has been installed, look in the settings menu of your iPhone to see if it is listed.
• The application can be found in the “App Store” after it has gone live. The application will be available for supported OS versions. You should ensure the application is available in the “App Store” of supported OS versions. It shouldn’t be listed in the “App Store” of unsupported OS versions.
• Ensure that the application runs in the background in sleep mode to prevent battery drain.
• A progress status icon (“Loading…”) with a specific message is helpful if the application performs slowly or whenever content is loading.
• Check whether the application is listed in the device search bar by searching for its name
• Check that the appearance of standard app buttons has not been changed (for example, organize, refresh, trash, reply, back, etc.).
• It is important to verify that standard buttons are not being used for other purposes than those they are normally intended for

iOS Automation Frameworks

Here are some examples of automation frameworks commonly used:

• Appium:

Tests on iOS applications are automated with Appium using Selenium Web driver.

Using Appium, a platform that is independent of the language, it can be used on both the web and mobile devices [Android and iOS]. It is an Open Source platform that does not restrict a user to specific languages.No matter what type of application it is, Appium works seamlessly regardless of its type: native, hybrid, or web.

• UI Automation:

There are some similarities between the UI Automation built by Apple and the UI Automator built by Android. In both cases, Apple defines the API and Java is used to build the tests.

• KIF:

In short, KIF stands for “Keep it Functional”. The framework was developed by a third party and is available on the Internet. A framework for iOS integration tests that is closely related and used for XCTest tests. With KIF, you do not need an additional web server or package since it can be configured or integrated easily with Xcode projects. KIF covers a wide range of iOS versions.

• Calabash:

Test automation can be performed on both Android and iOS using Cabaash, a cross-platform open source framework. It is easy to understand how Calabash tests work because they are written in Cucumber, the same language as specifications. Calabash includes libraries that allow users to interact with native and hybrid applications. The application supports gestures, assertions, screenshots, and so on.

• Earl Grey:

There are many different Google products that have been tested with Earl Grey, including YouTube, Google Photos, Google Play Music, Google Calendar, and more. There has recently been an open source version of Earl Grey. This is very similar to Espresso, which is used for Android UI automation. Earl Grey has built-in synchronization, visibility checks before interactions, and real user interaction.

Conclusion

A fierce competition and high expectations exist among mobile apps at the moment. In order for your iPhone app to succeed, testing can really help. Because you can test across a wide variety of devices, you can make sure it works well before it is distributed. So that you can concentrate on developing apps rather than maintaining infrastructure, LambdaTest takes care of all maintenance, security, and cleaning of devices.