Test patterns help you create your tests for Web service components depending on what exactly you want to test. You select the test pattern to use as part of the Create Web Service Component Test wizard. All tests based on these patterns use data from the test data table.
Method-level testing exercises the different conditions defined in the method code in isolation from other methods, allowing you to test each individual method independently. The focus is generally to ensure that the method correctly processes all of its possible inputs. Method-level testing is often a required first step toward class-level testing.
The method-level test pattern creates a test behavior script with an associated test data table to test one or more public methods from one or more public, non-abstract classes, allowing you to test each individual method independently. When you create a method-level test, a test case is created for each method selected.
Scenario-based testing exercises the interactions between the methods in a Web service. The focus is to verify that the Web service supports all of the use cases required by its consumers and is robust enough to handle unexpected sequences of methods. For example, you could invoke a port locator and a series of operations that represent the most common flows for that Web service.
The scenario-based pattern creates a test behavior script with an associated test data table to test a sequence of public methods from one or more public, non-abstract classes. When you create a scenario-based test, one test case is created for the entire scenario.