Selenium

Tips & Tricks

by Dave Haeffner
@TourDeDave
 New to Selenium?

• Selenium Bootcamp http://bit.ly/se-bootcamp

• Selenium Guidebook http://bit.ly/se-guidebook

• Weekly Selenium Tips http://bit.ly/se-weekly-tips

http://ElementalSelenium.com
etc.
http://the-internet.herokuapp.com/
Headless
Benefits:
- Speed
- Maintenance
- Screenshotting
 Headless w/ Xvfb
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/38-headless
Why use it?

Ideal for running small test suites on a headless machine

e.g., a Continuous Integration (CI) Server
NOTE
- display port collisions
- use unique values
- e.g., CI build number
 Headless w/ GhostDriver
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/46-headless-ghostdriver
http://phantomjs.org/
Why use it?

• Faster execution times

• Also useful for a CI server
• Not limited to just Linux
Step 1 - Download PhantomJS
http://phantomjs.org/download.html

Step 2 - Start PhantomJS w/ WebDriver flag

Step 3 - Connect Your Test to PhantomJS

using Selenium Remote

NOTE
You can also connect PhantomJS to a Selenium Grid
http://bit.ly/ghost-driver-grid
Visual Testing
 A Visual Testing Primer
• check that an application’s UI appears correctly to its users

• goal: find visual bugs before the user does

• e.g., font, layout, rendering issues

• can also be used to verify content

• e.g., charts, dashboards, etc.

• hundreds of assertions for a few lines of code

• at least 16 open source solutions available to choose from

Visual Testing Challenges

• Managing complexity

• False positives

• e.g., shifting content, dynamic content, typos

Visual Testing Write-ups

http://bit.ly/se-visual-1 Getting Started

http://bit.ly/se-visual-2 False Positives part 1

http://bit.ly/se-visual-3 False Positives part 2

http://bit.ly/se-visual-4 Add Visual Testing To Your Existing Tests

http://bit.ly/se-visual-5 Add Visual Testing To Your BDD Tests

Selenium Grid Resources

• http://elementalselenium.com/tips/26-cloud

• http://elementalselenium.com/tips/52-grid

• http://elementalselenium.com/tips/70-grid-extras
Fun with a Proxy Server
 Application
Proxy
Selenium Browser Under
Server
Test
 HTTP Status Codes
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/17-retrieve-http-status-codes
 Configuration

• Use a proxy server to capture the traffic from your

Selenium test(s)

• Find the status code for the action you’re interested

in (e.g., visiting a URL)

• Assert that the status code is what you expect

 Blacklisting
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/66-blacklist
 Configuration

• Use a proxy server to manipulate the traffic from

your Selenium test(s)

• Identify third-party resources that are slow to load

(which could negatively impact your tests)

• Blacklist them (e.g., make it so they don’t load)

 Load Testing
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/68-load-testing-revisited
 Configuration

• Use a proxy server to capture the traffic from your

Selenium test(s)

• Convert the HTTP Archive into a JMeter JMX file

• Run the new JMX file with JMeter to enact load on

your application (modify as needed)
Adapted from ruby-jmeter example from flood.io
https://github.com/flood-io/ruby-jmeter
Broken Image Checking
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/67-broken-images
Option 1 - Proxy Server

Option 2 - HTTP Library

Option 3 - JavaScript
Option 1: Proxy Server
Proxy Server Cont’d
Proxy Server Cont’d
Proxy Server Cont’d
Option 2: HTTP Library
HTTP Library Cont’d
HTTP Library Cont’d
Option 3: JavaScript
JavaScript Cont’d
JavaScript Cont’d
JavaScript Cont’d
 Forgot Password
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/43-forgot-password
 Configuration
• Use Selenium to trigger a forgot password workflow
(to a Gmail account) and keep the browser session
active

• Retrieve the e-mail and the password information

via the Gmail API

• Use the password information in the active

Selenium session (if applicable)
 A/B Testing
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/12-opt-out-of-ab-tests
 http://the-internet.herokuapp.com/abtest

• 3 page states available

• You can identify which state you’re in because

there is different header text for each

• When you’re in the control: A/B Test Control

• For the variation: A/B Test Variation 1

• When you’re not in a test: No A/B Test

 Configuration

• You can easily opt-out of A/B tests by

• forging a cookie

• appending a query to the URL

• This way you get a known state of the page which

isn’t likely to change without your knowledge
File Management
Uploading a File
 Workaround

• Rather than use something like AutoIt (which is a

bad idea)

• You can send the file path you want to upload into
the form input field (side-stepping the system
dialog entirely)
http://bit.ly/se-file-detector
 Downloading a File
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/2-download-a-file
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/8-download-a-file-revisited
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/15-download-secure-files
 Two approaches
• Configure Selenium to download to local disk, and
delete the file when done

• Use an HTTP library, perform a HEAD request, and

check the headers for the correct content type &
length.

Why?
• An order of magnitude faster using Selenium
• No need to download the file
With Selenium
With Selenium
With an HTTP library
With an HTTP library (for secure files)
Additional Output
 Highlight Elements
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/65-highlight-elements
Growl Notifications
http://elementalselenium.com/tips/53-growl
 New to Selenium?

• Selenium Bootcamp http://bit.ly/se-bootcamp

• Selenium Guidebook http://bit.ly/se-guidebook

• Weekly Selenium Tips http://bit.ly/se-weekly-tips

http://ElementalSelenium.com http://bit.ly/oss-es-tips
Get in touch
@TourDeDave

dhaeffner@gmail.com

DaveHaeffner.com