What is Failover Testing :
Failover testing is a technique that validates if a system can allocate extra resources and back up all the information and operations when a system fails abruptly due to some reason. This test determines the ability of a system to handle critical failures and handle extra servers. So, the testing is independent of the physical hardware component of a server.
It is preferred that testing should be performed by servers. Active-active and active-passive standby are the two most common configurations. Both the techniques achieve failover in a very different manner but both of them are performed to improve the server’s reliability.
For example, if we have three servers, one of them fails due to heavy load, and then two situations occur. Either that failed server will restart on its own or in another situation when the failed server cannot be restarted, the remaining servers will handle the load. Such situations are tested during this test.
Failover Testing in Software Testing
Software products/services are tested multiple times before delivery to ensure that it is providing the required service. Testing before delivery doesn’t guarantee that no problem will occur in the future. Even sometimes the software application fails due to some unwanted event due to network issues or due to server-related problems. Failover testing aims to respond to these types of failures.
Suppose that the PC gets off due to some technical issue, and on restarting we open the browser, then a pop-up is shown saying Do you want to restore all pages? On clicking restore, all tabs are restored. The process of ensuring such restorations is known as FAILOVER TESTING.