[Freeswitch-users] Question regarding testing IVRs

[Andy Spitzer]

Woof!

On Tue, 09 Feb 2010 23:23:35 -0500, Pablo Hernan Saro  
<pablosaro at gmail.com> wrote:

> I was wondering if anyone knows about an automated tool for testing IVR  
> systems

There are the expensive systems out there you can spend $$$ on (e.g.  
Empirix Hammer), or you can just code up some scripts that drive a second  
instance of FreeSWITCH to place calls, dial digits, etc.  I prefer the  
latter, especially for simple load testing.  If you instrument your IVR so  
that these scripts can externally determine what state each call is in  
(often just by polling the log files), then this can be an excellent tool  
for more complicated testing scenarios as well.

But beware...writing a decent IVR test script (for any platform, be it  
home brew or commercial), can end up being about an order of magnitude  
more complicated than the building the original system under test.  This  
is because while an IVR system can just wait for something to happen or  
timeout, the test system should track response times, statistics, vary  
it's input but still be within certain ranges, query the same database the  
IVR is using to know about account numbers, state, etc.

For many cases, just automating simple calls to generate load, and then  
having a person call in and exercise the complicated bits of the IVR while  
under load will get you pretty far.

--Woof!