A Look at Some Basic Things about Selenium Automation Testing Tool

In the software industry once a product reaches the phase where it has to be tested manually, every organization toys with the idea of automated testing in order to save the cost that is associated with manual testing. The cost is undoubtedly, an important factor for any project. As a result, several enterprises prefer the open source test automation tools instead of opting for commercial tools that are quite costly. In addition the open source automation testing tools offer competitive features for testing the both the web and software applications automatically. In this regard, there are several testing tools that are perfect for Web, regression, UAT, etc. As far as the open source tools are concerned, Selenium is, perhaps, the best option that you can get.

Why use Selenium?

This is a basic question that any organization might ask. With so many open source tools available why choose Selenium? The reason behind the popularity of Selenium lies in its multiple functions. Firstly, it is applicable for both GUI as well s the functionality. It can also be applied as a unit testing tool as far as JavaScript is concerned.

Components present in Selenium

This tool has several tests components within its test package. However, there are 3 major tools that help in developing the automatic testing process for web applications – Selenium Grid, IDE and RC. The IDE is used as a Firefox extension that is used to record the test suites and cases. The Selenium RC is utilized to run tests on various systems and browsers. Finally, the Grid can run many instances of the RC at a time. In addition, there is the Qualitia and Tellurium that acts as a wrapper for the tools’ engine.

Let’s take a look at these components in details:

Selenium IDE: This is a completely integrated development environment for testing. Implemented as a Firefox add-on, it also enables editing, debugging and recording tests. Initially, known as the Recorder, the IDE was donated to the Selenium project in the year 2006.

With the help of this component scripts can recorded and edited automatically. This provides a support to the auto completion and helps to move the commands quickly. The recording is done in Selenese (a special language for scripting). It offers the commands in order to perform the actions in a browser. It is also used for retrieving data from the result pages.

Client API: Besides using Selenese there are various other languages that can be used for writing tests. The tests then make us of the Client API to communicate with Selenium. This client is presently used for Ruby, Java, Python and C#.

Remote Control: This is a server that has been written in Java. It easily accepts the commands through HTTP for the browsers. The RC makes it possible for the programmers to write automated tests in any kind of programming languages, especially for the web applications. This enables netter integration of the Selenium in the already existing unit test framework.

WebDriver: This is recognized as the successor of RC. The Selenium WebDriver accepts commands that are either sent through Client API or Selenese. These are finally sent to the browser. The USP of this tool is that it can start a browser instantly as well as control it.

Selenium Grid: This is a server that enables the tests to utilize the web browser instances that are running on the remote machines. Here one of the servers will act as the hub. The tests will contact the hub so that to access the browser instances. There is a list of servers in the Grid that helps to achieve this end. It will also allow the tests to run parallel on the multiple machines, manage the various browser versions and its configurations from a central point.

These are some of the basic aspects about the Selenium tool that would actually help the programmers during the automated testing process. To get maximum benefits of testing, you may consider hiring services of a selenium automated testing company.

We provide selenium web app testing services. If you would like to discuss with a certified selenium tester from our team, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.