Automation Improvements to LTE eNodeB User Plane Software Integration Testing

01 January 2016

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The LTE eNodeB base station software is composed of various interconnected components, which handle different functionalities. Integration testing is used to test the interfaces and interactions between the components when they are combined together. In agile software development new software component builds are created frequently, which leads to a need for a quick and automated testing environment. This thesis focuses on improving the level of automation in the LTE User Plane software integration testing continuous integration environment. Two different subjects, interface specification adaptation and test scenario configuration, are addressed in this study. An automated system triggered by the continuous integration platform is implemented to update the testing environment so that it complies with the latest interface specification. In addition, a new software tool is developed as a proof of concept for an alternative method for test script writing and test case creation. The tool is used to create and configure test scenarios in a graphical user interface and to automatically generate test scripts from the configuration instead of writing the test scripts manually. The operation of the automated adaptation system was observed for more than a year with over a hundred interface specification changes. Results show a substantial reduction in processing time when comparing to the earlier manual process and no errors were detected in the output. The new software tool for creating test scenarios achieves its goal. The tool enables the creation and configuration of basic test scenarios in the graphical user interface and the generated test scripts can be executed successfully.