Cashless Card Payment System Meets Tight Development Deadlines with Datamaker

Grid-Tools Ltd | 23 Jul 2008

Grid-Tools Limited, a leading vendor of test data management software, helps sQuidcard meet a tight development schedule for its e-Money alternative to debit and credit card networks. sQuidcard were faced with the challenge of launching an e-Money alternative to the debit and credit card networks, which could potentially handle millions of customers and transactions. Experts predict rapid growth in this market, with sQuidcard well positioned to replace some of the £200bn sub-£10 cash transactions made each year in the UK.

The data underlying the system had to be tested to the limit
The main problem was a tight development schedule, and the need to test the solution rigorously. sQuidcard neither had the time to key this data by hand, nor the capability to generate realistic data on a large scale to test the system under a diverse range of scenarios.

"The testing had to simulate a situation where sQuid had been in existence for a number of months, or years," explained Richard Buckley, Technical Director of Applied Card Technologies Ltd (ACT). "When rolling out a solution of this complexity, to millions of card holders and potentially handling tens of millions of transactions a year, you have to be certain that the data underlying the system is tested to the limit."

Automated data generation of quality test data
sQuidcard selected Grid-Tools to work closely with ACT, a specialist in the area of designing, developing, installing and operating smart card transaction systems. sQuidcard chose Grid-Tools to automate the process of creating quality test data, which allowed a parallel approach to development and testing within this project. This meant that developers could work on other stages of the project, without having to wait for the preceding stages to be completed. sQuidcard was in need of a tool that could create test data and populate a database in a short timeframe. "Using Grid-Tools allowed us to meet our deliverables too," commented Richard Buckley. "Without the Grid-Tools data generation product, the tight delivery dates for the sQuidcard project could certainly have slipped."

Simulating real-life scenarios for robust testing
ACT and Grid-Tools quickly established a strong working partnership on the project. "Huw of Grid-Tools is a technologist like me, and we were able to talk in the same language," said Richard. "Grid-Tools were allowed secure access to our development database and were able to work remotely. They had the appropriate tools for working within the restrictions of our network and understood our security precautions." ACT benefited from using a trial version of the Grid-Tools software, commented Richard: "we were able to become familiar with the tool, and understand its effectiveness in the context of sQuidcard's specific data model." Grid-Tools solution could have an application in later stages of the project as well, concludes Richard, "once the system is live, we can use the tools to assess how the system would scale up to ten million card holders."

About Grid-Tools
Grid-Tools' software enables organisations with databases to achieve legal compliance, to increase the productivity of its IT staff and to improve the price/performance of its infrastructure. Grid-Tools' solutions apply to test data management and information lifecycle management. The core product automates the discovery and documentation of database structures: add-on modules generate, anonymise or subset test databases, or archive production databases.

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