Selenium (software)
Encyclopedia
Selenium is a portable software testing
framework
for web application
s. Selenium provides a record/playback tool for authoring tests without learning a test scripting language
(Selenium IDE). It also provides a test domain-specific language (Selenese)
to write tests in a number of popular programming languages, including C#, Java, Groovy, Perl
, PHP
, Python
and Ruby
. The tests can then be run against most modern web browser
s. Selenium deploys on Windows
, Linux
, and Macintosh
platforms.
History=
Selenium was originally developed by Jason Huggins, who was later joined by other programmers and testers at ThoughtWorks
. It is open-source software
, released under the Apache 2.0 license
and can be downloaded and used without charge. The latest side project is Selenium Grid, which provides a hub allowing the running of multiple Selenium tests concurrently on any number of local or remote systems, thus minimizing test execution time.
(IDE) for Selenium tests. It is implemented as a Firefox extension, and allows recording, editing, and debugging tests. It was previously known as Selenium Recorder.
Scripts may be automatically recorded and edited manually providing autocompletion
support and the ability to move commands around quickly.
Scripts are recorded in Selenese, a special test scripting language for selenium. Selenese provides commands for performing actions in a browser (click a link, select an option), and for retrieving data from the resulting pages.
Features:
With Selenium 2, a new Client API was introduced (with WebDriver as its central component). However, the old API (using class Selenium) is still supported.
, that accepts commands for the browser via HTTP
. RC makes it possible to write automated tests for a web application in any programming language, which allows for better integration of Selenium in existing unit test frameworks. To make writing tests easier, Selenium project currently provides client drivers for PHP
, Python
, Ruby
, .NET
, Perl
and Java
. The Java driver can also be used with JavaScript
(via the Rhino
engine). A new instance of selenium RC server is needed to launch html test case - which means that the port should be different for each parallel run. However for Java/PHP test case only one Selenium RC instance needs to be running continuously.
With the release of Selenium 2, Selenium RC has been officially deprecated in favor of Selenium WebDriver.
browser driver, which simulates a browser using HtmlUnit.
Unlike in Selenium 1, where the Selenium RC server was necessary to run tests, Selenium WebDriver does not need a special server to execute tests. Instead, the WebDriver directly starts a browser instance and controls it.
However, Selenium Grid can be used with WebDriver to execute tests on remote systems (see below).
Software testing
Software testing is an investigation conducted to provide stakeholders with information about the quality of the product or service under test. Software testing can also provide an objective, independent view of the software to allow the business to appreciate and understand the risks of software...
framework
Software framework
In computer programming, a software framework is an abstraction in which software providing generic functionality can be selectively changed by user code, thus providing application specific software...
for web application
Web application
A web application is an application that is accessed over a network such as the Internet or an intranet. The term may also mean a computer software application that is coded in a browser-supported language and reliant on a common web browser to render the application executable.Web applications are...
s. Selenium provides a record/playback tool for authoring tests without learning a test scripting language
Scripting language
A scripting language, script language, or extension language is a programming language that allows control of one or more applications. "Scripts" are distinct from the core code of the application, as they are usually written in a different language and are often created or at least modified by the...
(Selenium IDE). It also provides a test domain-specific language (Selenese)
to write tests in a number of popular programming languages, including C#, Java, Groovy, Perl
Perl
Perl is a high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language. Perl was originally developed by Larry Wall in 1987 as a general-purpose Unix scripting language to make report processing easier. Since then, it has undergone many changes and revisions and become widely popular...
, PHP
PHP
PHP is a general-purpose server-side scripting language originally designed for web development to produce dynamic web pages. For this purpose, PHP code is embedded into the HTML source document and interpreted by a web server with a PHP processor module, which generates the web page document...
, Python
Python (programming language)
Python is a general-purpose, high-level programming language whose design philosophy emphasizes code readability. Python claims to "[combine] remarkable power with very clear syntax", and its standard library is large and comprehensive...
and Ruby
Ruby (programming language)
Ruby is a dynamic, reflective, general-purpose object-oriented programming language that combines syntax inspired by Perl with Smalltalk-like features. Ruby originated in Japan during the mid-1990s and was first developed and designed by Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto...
. The tests can then be run against most modern web browser
Web browser
A web browser is a software application for retrieving, presenting, and traversing information resources on the World Wide Web. An information resource is identified by a Uniform Resource Identifier and may be a web page, image, video, or other piece of content...
s. Selenium deploys on Windows
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...
, Linux
Linux
Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
, and Macintosh
Macintosh
The Macintosh , or Mac, is a series of several lines of personal computers designed, developed, and marketed by Apple Inc. The first Macintosh was introduced by Apple's then-chairman Steve Jobs on January 24, 1984; it was the first commercially successful personal computer to feature a mouse and a...
platforms.
History=
Selenium was originally developed by Jason Huggins, who was later joined by other programmers and testers at ThoughtWorks
ThoughtWorks
ThoughtWorks is a privately owned global IT consultancy that delivers custom software, software tools, consulting, and transformation services to Global 1000 companies. It has a products division, ThoughtWorks Studios, which creates and markets software development and project management applications...
. It is open-source software
Open-source software
Open-source software is computer software that is available in source code form: the source code and certain other rights normally reserved for copyright holders are provided under a software license that permits users to study, change, improve and at times also to distribute the software.Open...
, released under the Apache 2.0 license
Apache License
The Apache License is a copyfree free software license authored by the Apache Software Foundation . The Apache License requires preservation of the copyright notice and disclaimer....
and can be downloaded and used without charge. The latest side project is Selenium Grid, which provides a hub allowing the running of multiple Selenium tests concurrently on any number of local or remote systems, thus minimizing test execution time.
Selenium IDE
Selenium IDE is a complete integrated development environmentIntegrated development environment
An integrated development environment is a software application that provides comprehensive facilities to computer programmers for software development...
(IDE) for Selenium tests. It is implemented as a Firefox extension, and allows recording, editing, and debugging tests. It was previously known as Selenium Recorder.
Scripts may be automatically recorded and edited manually providing autocompletion
Autocomplete
Autocomplete is a feature provided by many web browsers, e-mail programs, search engine interfaces, source code editors, database query tools, word processors, and command line interpreters. Autocomplete involves the program predicting a word or phrase that the user wants to type in without the...
support and the ability to move commands around quickly.
Scripts are recorded in Selenese, a special test scripting language for selenium. Selenese provides commands for performing actions in a browser (click a link, select an option), and for retrieving data from the resulting pages.
Features:
- Record and playback
- Intelligent field selection will use IDs, names, or XPathXPathXPath is a language for selecting nodes from an XML document. In addition, XPath may be used to compute values from the content of an XML document...
as needed - Autocomplete for all common Selenium commands
- Walk throughSoftware walkthroughIn software engineering, a walkthrough or walk-through is a form of software peer review "in which a designer or programmer leads members of the development team and other interested parties through a software product, and the participants ask questions and make comments about possible errors,...
tests - Debug and set breakpoints
- Save tests as Selenese, RubyRuby (programming language)Ruby is a dynamic, reflective, general-purpose object-oriented programming language that combines syntax inspired by Perl with Smalltalk-like features. Ruby originated in Japan during the mid-1990s and was first developed and designed by Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto...
scripts, or other formats - Support for Selenium user-extensions.js file
- Option to automatically assert the title of every page
Selenium Client API
As an alternative to writing tests in Selenese, tests can also be written in various programming languages. These tests then communicate with Selenium by calling methods in the Selenium Client API. Selenium currently provides client APIs for Java, C#, Ruby and Python.With Selenium 2, a new Client API was introduced (with WebDriver as its central component). However, the old API (using class Selenium) is still supported.
Selenium Remote Control
Selenium Remote Control (RC) is a server, written in JavaJava (programming language)
Java is a programming language originally developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems and released in 1995 as a core component of Sun Microsystems' Java platform. The language derives much of its syntax from C and C++ but has a simpler object model and fewer low-level facilities...
, that accepts commands for the browser via HTTP
Hypertext Transfer Protocol
The Hypertext Transfer Protocol is a networking protocol for distributed, collaborative, hypermedia information systems. HTTP is the foundation of data communication for the World Wide Web....
. RC makes it possible to write automated tests for a web application in any programming language, which allows for better integration of Selenium in existing unit test frameworks. To make writing tests easier, Selenium project currently provides client drivers for PHP
PHP
PHP is a general-purpose server-side scripting language originally designed for web development to produce dynamic web pages. For this purpose, PHP code is embedded into the HTML source document and interpreted by a web server with a PHP processor module, which generates the web page document...
, Python
Python (programming language)
Python is a general-purpose, high-level programming language whose design philosophy emphasizes code readability. Python claims to "[combine] remarkable power with very clear syntax", and its standard library is large and comprehensive...
, Ruby
Ruby (programming language)
Ruby is a dynamic, reflective, general-purpose object-oriented programming language that combines syntax inspired by Perl with Smalltalk-like features. Ruby originated in Japan during the mid-1990s and was first developed and designed by Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto...
, .NET
.NET Framework
The .NET Framework is a software framework that runs primarily on Microsoft Windows. It includes a large library and supports several programming languages which allows language interoperability...
, Perl
Perl
Perl is a high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language. Perl was originally developed by Larry Wall in 1987 as a general-purpose Unix scripting language to make report processing easier. Since then, it has undergone many changes and revisions and become widely popular...
and Java
Java (programming language)
Java is a programming language originally developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems and released in 1995 as a core component of Sun Microsystems' Java platform. The language derives much of its syntax from C and C++ but has a simpler object model and fewer low-level facilities...
. The Java driver can also be used with JavaScript
JavaScript
JavaScript is a prototype-based scripting language that is dynamic, weakly typed and has first-class functions. It is a multi-paradigm language, supporting object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles....
(via the Rhino
Rhino (JavaScript engine)
Rhino is an open source JavaScript engine. It is developed entirely in Java and managed by the Mozilla Foundation. The Foundation also provides another implementation of JavaScript engine written in C known as SpiderMonkey....
engine). A new instance of selenium RC server is needed to launch html test case - which means that the port should be different for each parallel run. However for Java/PHP test case only one Selenium RC instance needs to be running continuously.
With the release of Selenium 2, Selenium RC has been officially deprecated in favor of Selenium WebDriver.
Selenium WebDriver
Selenium WebDriver is the successor to Selenium RC. Selenium WebDriver accepts commands (sent in Selenese, or via a Client API) and sends them to a browser. This is implemented through a browser-specific browser driver, which sends commands to a browser, and retrieves results. Most browser drivers actually launch and access a browser application (such as Firefox or Internet Explorer); there is also a HtmlUnitHtmlUnit
HtmlUnit is a headless web browser written in Java. It allows high-level manipulation of websites from other Java code, including filling and submitting forms and clicking hyperlinks. It also provides access to the structure and the details within received web pages. HtmlUnit emulates parts of...
browser driver, which simulates a browser using HtmlUnit.
Unlike in Selenium 1, where the Selenium RC server was necessary to run tests, Selenium WebDriver does not need a special server to execute tests. Instead, the WebDriver directly starts a browser instance and controls it.
However, Selenium Grid can be used with WebDriver to execute tests on remote systems (see below).
Selenium Grid
Selenium Grid is a server that allows tests to use web browser instances running on remote machines. With Selenium Grid, one server acts as the hub. Tests contact the hub to obtain access to browser instances. The hub has a list of servers that provide access to browser instances (WebDriver nodes), and lets tests use these instances. Selenium Grid allows to run tests in parallel on multiple machines, and to manage different browser versions and browser configurations centrally (instead of in each individual test).See also
- iMacrosIMacrosiMacros is an extension for the Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, and Internet Explorer web browsers which adds record and replay functionality similar to that found in web testing and form filler software. The macros can be combined and controlled via JavaScript. Demo macros and JavaScript code...
- MediaWiki Selenium extension
- MediaWiki Selenium Framework extension
- HtmlUnitHtmlUnitHtmlUnit is a headless web browser written in Java. It allows high-level manipulation of websites from other Java code, including filling and submitting forms and clicking hyperlinks. It also provides access to the structure and the details within received web pages. HtmlUnit emulates parts of...
- Regression testingRegression testingRegression testing is any type of software testing that seeks to uncover new errors, or regressions, in existing functionality after changes have been made to a system, such as functional enhancements, patches or configuration changes....
- WatirWatirWeb Application Testing in Ruby is a toolkit used to automate browser-based tests during web application development. This automated test tool uses the Ruby scripting language to drive Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera and Safari, and is available as a RubyGems gem...