Debugging Selenium Tests

At the time a test fails, it passes through the Selenium client, Selenium Server (or Selenium RC in Selenium 1), the browser, the Javascript mechanism and the application function.

The testers usually have 5 degrees of separation in relation to the cause of the problem. Most of us are interested in knowing how the code is running. Sometimes, even if we write the code without syntax errors during execution, we face problems that require code debugging.

As the web controller script runs quickly, if we want to run the web driver code line by line and check if the output can be obtained using the debug mode in Eclipse.

The first technique is to capture a screenshot every time a test fails. There are some methods provided for this:

·         Capture Screenshot

·         Capture ScreenshotToString

Ø  Access Capture Screenshots of Selenium Failures, in the YouDevise Developer blog, provides an example of Java code to know how this approach can be implemented.

Ø  The second technique is to capture the contents of the HTML DOM when a test fails. For this, Wellman recommends using the getHtmlSource method to capture the contents of the DOM and burn them to a file.

Taking the time to incorporate these two techniques could pay generously in time saved debugging.This is not the first time that Wellman wrote about the value of investing in his tools to get more productivity.

Below are the problems I frequently encounter when using the Selenium:

v  Element is not ready yet. Selenium reports 'Element not found'. In Ajax environments this is usually caused when the Selenium test is out of sync with the web application. I have solved this by adding the waitForElementPresent commands before each click, type, view and validate the command

v  Selenium jump points. Right-click on a Selenium command in the Selenium IDE or in the Test Test Designer to set a breakpoint. After the Selenium IDE or the designer reaches this point of interruption, you can inspect the state of the application using the Firebug debug utility.

v  TestMaker Object Designer evaluation guide. The Designer allows you to make calls from the Javascript API to the Javascript engine that is running the Designer or the Javascript mechanism executing the Ajax Web objects of the application being tested.

v  The debugging of your tests is easy and useful - it allows you to test your behavior line a In the event of an error in the operating system, it must be taken into account that the operating system is not compatible with the operating system.

v  IDE compatible with debugging (PHPStorm, NetBeans, etc.)  Start Administrator with the parameter –xdebug.

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