Service Virtualization

Using service virtualization (SV) with Silk4J enables you to simulate back-end services of a web application. This allows you to easily test components of complex web applications which you cannot properly access or configure for testing. When running tests in Silk4J, you can use a virtualized service with your test in place of a real service of your application under test (AUT).

For example, using a real credit card service when testing an AUT that provides the ability to purchase something is not practical, as a real credit card will need to be charged for each purchase. In such a case, using a virtualized service during testing is preferable.

Silk4J utilizes service virtualization functionality provided by SV Lab. For detailed information about the capabilities of SV Lab, refer to the SV Lab documentation.

Service virtualization in Silk4J includes the following stages:
  • Creating a new Silk4J test for your application.
  • Configuring the browsers against which you want to test your application to use the service virtualization proxy server.
  • Discovering the endpoints in your application.
  • Learning which data is transmitted through specific endpoints.
  • Integrating the service virtualization with the test.
  • Customizing the virtualization script.
  • Simulating the web service behavior by transmitting simulated data through the endpoints.
Tip: In addition to the capabilities provided in the Silk4J UI, you can use the svlab.properties file to configure some settings for service virtualization, for example the outbound proxy server that is used to connect to the web. The file is located in the Silk Test application data directory, under %APPDATA%/Silk/SilkTest/conf/.