In my previous articles, I have already discussed the topics "How to create Test Data" and "Top 3 Challenges in using Production data in Test Environments". In this post we will focus on the challenges that we face in Production Cloning approach and how to overcome those challenges.
Even though it is highly recommended to have the Test Environment in the same lines as Production, it is not always feasible to test under those real-time conditions. It is highly recommended to do Performance / load / stress tests exactly mimicking the Production database, but the expensive infrastructure requirements might be an overkill for Functional Testing. But cloning might force you to have production like infrastructure which will translate into higher costs for the customer.
Another major challenge associated with Production Cloning is that all the production data needs to be stored in testing region. Assuming the production data is 50 TBs (Terabytes), the Test Database also needs to hold 50 TBs of data. So storage has to be provided for storing all of the data. And with the databases being backed up regularly, that would mean higher storage costs for the customer.
