Small Talks/2013/July/ZK Testing with Selenium IDE

Author
Robert Wenzel, Engineer, Potix Corporation

Date
July 2013

Version
ZK 6.5 (or later)

This page is under construction, so we cannot guarantee the accuracy of the content!

Introduction

About this article

nice application, how to test ... refer to zats... some things need to be tested in a real browser, so selenium comes into play... how to create tests

programmatically... link to older Small Talk?? or use Selenium-IDE to record/tweak/maintain!! and replay/debug -- this article :D

Environment

• Firefox (used with 21.0)
• Selenium IDE 2.0.0
• JDK 6/7
• ZK 6.5.3 6/7
• Maven 3.0

Steps

Initialize your testing environment

• download Selenium IDE 2.0.0 link
  • docu http://wiki.openqa.org/display/SIDE/Home
• Maven 3.0
  • download link
  • setup maven

• download link (test project)
• maven: mvn jetty:run
• localhost:8080

(- war file ) ???

Initial Situation

1. Launch Selenium IDE CTRL+ALT+S
2. open example app localhost:8080
3. Record login-test and replay it

New Test
open	/selenium_testing/login.zul
type	id=jXDW5	test
type	id=jXDW8	test
clickAndWait	id=jXDWb

looks hard to read / maintain and doesn't even work :'(

Looking at the recorded commands and comparing with page source we notice the IDs are generated and changing with every request. So no chance to record / replay this way.

A way to make the IDs predictable is shown in the next Section.

Custom Id Generator

As mentioned in other Small Talks about testing one strategy is to use a custom IdGenerator implementation to create predictable, readable (with a business meaning) and easily selectable (by selenium) component ids.

public class TestingIdGenerator implements IdGenerator {

	public String nextComponentUuid(Desktop desktop, Component comp,
			ComponentInfo compInfo) {
        int i = Integer.parseInt(desktop.getAttribute("Id_Num").toString());
        i++;// Start from 1
        
        StringBuilder uuid = new StringBuilder("");
        
        desktop.setAttribute("Id_Num", String.valueOf(i));
        if(compInfo != null) {
        	String id = getId(compInfo);
        	if(id != null) {
        		uuid.append(id).append("_");
        	}
        	String tag = compInfo.getTag();
        	if(tag != null) {
        		uuid.append(tag).append("_");
        	}
        }
        return uuid.length() == 0 ? "zkcomp_" + i : uuid.append(i).toString();
    }

The IDs will look like this:

• {id}_{tag}_{##} (for components with a given id)
• {tag}_{##} (for components without a given id - e.g. listitems in a listbox)
• {zkcomp}_{##} (for other cases, just to make them unique)

e.g. a button in zul-file

<button id="login" label="login" />

will become something like this in HTML in browser (number can vary):

<button id="login_button_12" class="z-button-os" type="button">login</button>

In order to separate production from test configuration we can include an additional config file at startup to enable the TestingIdGenerator only for testing. In ZK this is possible by setting the library property org.zkoss.zk.config.path (also refer to our Testing Tips)

e.g. via VM argument -Dorg.zkoss.zk.config.path=/WEB-INF/zk-test.xml

Windows:

set MAVEN_OPTS=-Dorg.zkoss.zk.config.path=/WEB-INF/zk-test.xml
mvn jetty:run

Linux:

export MAVEN_OPTS=-Dorg.zkoss.zk.config.path=/WEB-INF/zk-test.xml
mvn jetty:run

TODO: improve using maven profiles...

Now we get nicer and deterministic IDs when recording a test case.

After recording login-test again and we get this:

login test
open	/selenium_testing/login.zul
type	id=username_textbox_6	test
type	id=password_textbox_9	test
clickAndWait	id=login_button_12

This already looks nice, and self explaining - Unfortunately still fails to replay :(

Why this happens and how to fix it? See next section ...

ZK specific details

ZK heavily uses JavaScript and Selenium IDE does not record all events by default.

in our case here the "blur" events of the input fields have not been recorded, but ZK relies on them to determine updated fields. So we need to manually add selenium commands "fireEvent target blur" unfortunately Selenium does not offer a nice equivalent like "focus" action.

login test
open	/selenium_testing/login.zul
type	id=username_textbox_6	test
fireEvent	id=username_textbox_6	blur
type	id=password_textbox_9	test
fireEvent	id=password_textbox_9	blur
clickAndWait	id=login_button_12
assertLocation	glob:*/selenium_testing/index.zul
verifyTextPresent	Welcome test
verifyTextPresent	Feedback Overview

Replaying the script finally works :D, and we see the overview page (also added a few verifications for that).

Selenium Extensions

If you find the syntax of "fireEvent" ugly or think it is too inconvenient to add an additional line just to update an input field there help using a Selenium Core extension.

This snippet shows 2 simple custom actions

blur

convenience action to avoid "fireEvent locator blur"

typeAndBlur

combines the type with a blur event, to make ZK aware of the input change automatically

Selenium.prototype.doBlur = function(locator) {
    // All locator-strategies are automatically handled by "findElement"
    var element = this.page().findElement(locator);
    // Fire the "blur" event
    triggerEvent(element, "blur", false);
};

Selenium.prototype.doTypeAndBlur = function(locator, text) {
    // All locator-strategies are automatically handled by "findElement"
    var element = this.page().findElement(locator);

    // Replace the element text with the new text
    this.page().replaceText(element, text);
    // Fire the "blur" event
    triggerEvent(element, "blur", false);
};

user-extensions.js DOWNLOADable (file contains another extension ... more about that later in "making tests more robust and maintainable to UI updates")

add to Selenium IDE Options/Options... [General Tab] Selenium Core extensions

login test
open	/selenium_testing/login.zul
type	id=username_textbox_6	test
blur	id=username_textbox_6
type	id=password_textbox_9	test
blur	id=password_textbox_9
clickAndWait	id=login_button_12

login test
open	/selenium_testing/login.zul
typeAndBlur	id=username_textbox_6	test
typeAndBlur	id=password_textbox_9	test
clickAndWait	id=login_button_12

It is not required to use either of these extensions, but saving 1 line for each input is my personal preference.

Another think to keep in mind is robustness of test-cases to changes in the UI ... the generated numbers in the end of each ID are still prone to change everytime a component is added or removed above that component. Wouldn't it be nice to enable this? Read on...

Robust and maintainable Test Scripts

Stay tuned for updates ;)

bigger test

Let's record a test case for edit and save an existing "feedback item" in the list, and verify the results, and a logout test.