To ensure that a component-based software system can run properly and effectively, the qualities of constituent components have to be assured. Third-party certification is a safe approach that buyers should trust when dealing with component software. However, current third-party certification methods do not support roper functional testing, which is the most important factor when selecting the component.

In this paper we will suggest a framework of third party component testing of functionality, satisfying the following given constraint: evaluation of a large number of components within short period of time in a cost-effective way. In this framework, we identify the metadata that a component developer should provide to the third party tester and define the process for third party testing using these metadata. To evaluate our framework, we conducted several experiment with Component Test Manger (CTM), prototype tool for EJB component testing. The result shows that our metadata are positively necessary and the participation of a component developer is the key to third party testing.