The leading provider in technology and services for all aspects of oil and gas well operations
Weatherford International, a prominent multinational oil and gas company, excels in delivering innovative technology and energy services for oil and natural gas well operations, including formation evaluation, drilling, completion, production, and intervention.
Revolutionizing oil and gas operations with CygNet SCADA platform
Weatherford enhances oil and gas operations with its cutting-edge Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (SCADA) platform – CygNet. CygNet efficiently manages and analyzes real-time gas well operational data, serving as a powerful production optimization tool.
This platform collects, processes, and disseminates data from various sources to the relevant personnel in the organization to create a unified information ecosystem that encompasses production, pipeline, and business data for the entire oil and gas operation.
Specifically, his team uses Squish to test the Qt-based embedded touch screen on the front end of the relay. Jarkko utilizes both Squish for Qt on a Linux operating system for the touchscreen and Squish for Windows for the desktop version of the software.
Transforming and elevating automation performance with Squish
We spoke to Timothy Crooks of Weatherford’s automation team, who brought Squish into his team’s UI testing workflow to:
- Upgrade existing automation utilities in use
- Design new tests for enhanced regression test coverage
- Maintain the CygNet platform as a leading oil and gas operations tool with premium quality
An engineer with three decades of automation experience, Timothy holds a dual role in the company: an automation developer for UI workflow and a QA manager overseeing a team of five engineers.
Timothy’s work concerns test automation for the desktop client components of the CygNet SCADA platform.
After implementing Squish, Timothy initiated his initial automation project which involved rewriting the measurement client (including gas nomination and customer billing) of the platform using Squish.
This transition resulted in substantial performance improvements. Squish simplified tree traversal, enhanced grid cell data retrieval, and provided valuable capabilities for Data-Driven Testing (DDT).
Optimizing test processes with Squish automation
The redesign of tests previously created with the older Visual Test utility yielded significant improvements.
Timothy explained that the automation team conducts multi-layer tests to comprehensively assess the CygNet platform. These tests encompass unit and integration testing, along with Squish GUI tests at the desktop client level.
The test targets involve running multiple clients concurrently on three different Windows platforms. Collectively, these test suites cover a wide range of scenarios, from installation verification to managing multiple device dialogs and data configurations.
The total runtime for these suites is approximately three days. Thanks to Squish, test execution times were dramatically reduced, with one example test going from half a day to just a few hours.
The strategic vision of automation with Squish at Weatherford
Timothy focuses on the overarching perspective of automation, emphasizing the importance of comprehensive test coverage.
He explained that with every JIRA story and feature requiring automation, Squish serves as a significant asset for the team by serving as a reliable regression detector.
In considering the broader context, Timothy also shared his vision for employing Squish in future automation initiatives at Weatherford.
Automation strategies for Weatherford's Canvas HMI application
Weatherford's latest HMI development application, Canvas, was designed to create personalized operational screens. In 2020, it was set to receive increased automation attention from the team.
Timothy continued to use Squish to establish essential regression test coverage.
Additionally, he also had plans to expand the team by hiring more script developers to continue transitioning from Visual Test to Squish. The team also concentrated on automating both new and legacy technologies provided by the company.
Before its launch, Timothy anticipated running over 40 hours of coverage across three platforms by the end of 2020 – with Squish playing a pivotal role in achieving this extensive test coverage.
