Testinput

Testinput is a generic term used in software testing to denote input data used to exercise a system under test. It can include typical operational values, boundary conditions, edge cases, constraints, and unexpected or malformed inputs. Test inputs may be supplied manually in test cases or generated automatically by data providers, fixtures, or fuzzers.

The primary purpose of testinput is to verify correctness, robustness, performance, and security. By feeding known-good values, the tester confirms expected behavior; by using boundary or invalid inputs, the tester reveals defects such as crashes, exceptions, or incorrect error handling. In automated testing, testinput is organized into test cases with expected outputs.

Formats and sources: Testinput can take many forms, including numeric sequences, strings with special characters, large payloads, JSON or XML documents, binary streams, or protocol-specific messages. Test inputs may be derived from requirements, past bugs, or randomly generated data. Fuzz testing focuses on testinput generation to discover unhandled conditions.

Applications: In software development, testinput is used in unit tests, integration tests, property-based testing, and regression suites. In hardware testing, it may be stimuli for sensors or actuators. In machine learning, testinput is sometimes used to describe evaluation data, though the standard term is test data or test set.

Variants and naming: The term testinput is informal and interchangeable with test data, test vectors, fixtures, stimuli, or input data, depending on context. It emphasizes the input being supplied to the system rather than the test scenario.

See also: Test data, Test case, Input validation, Fuzz testing, Boundary value analysis.