Category: Test automation
Comparing files and alternatives(?) to Diff
May 28, 2010
Continuing the ‘what tool’ theme from last week, today’s topic is ‘Diff’. I frequently install windows versions of various Unix command line utilities via the Gnu Utilities for Win32 project. Diff is particularly handy not just for the programming side of automation, but also for comparing output files from automation as well as database queries. Occasionally […]
Celerity update
February 22, 2010
I’ve just updated my celerity gem and it seems to fix all of the warnings that were flooding my scripts before. Performance is still a touch disappointing with our website, but the changes make it much more usable (and there’s an option to turn javascript off now according to the docs at http://rubyforge.org/forum/forum.php?forum_id=34490).
A first step toward saying what we mean when we say "Automated testing"
July 27, 2008
“In the universe, nothing can be said to be automatic, as nothing can be said to be without design. An imperfect parallel may be found in human inventions; springs may move springs, and wheels, indexes; but the motion and the regulation must be derived from the artist;” From Elements of Chemical Philosophy Part 1, Vol.1 […]
"Tools for testers" course next month at STANZ
Paul Szymkowiak and I will be running a one-day workshop on tools for testers, as part of the STANZ conference. The current run on August 13th is full, but you can register your interest for future courses via SoftEd, or drop me a line. Details of the course are at http://www.softed.com/stanz/speakersandsessions.htm#tst I’ll have the presentation […]
Another Australian context-driven blog
May 14, 2008
Alister Scott, an Australian tester located in Brisbane has started a blog. There are a few Watir samples, and it’s always nice when a test automator puts their code up for scrutiny. I know my plans to do the same have taken far too long. Check his writing out at http://watirmelon.wordpress.com/
More on Tiny MCE and value threats
October 8, 2007
In response to Matt’s comment on the robustness of my Tiny MCE Watir solution, I’d like to point out that the main threat to the solution’s value for me is that I can no longer run the automation in the background. Send_keys seems to need the IE window to be the topmost window. A lot […]
Watir difficulties, problems and trouble with TinyMCE
September 4, 2007
I’ve spent far too much of the last day and a bit trying to get Watir to identify and manipulate the TinyMCE rich text edit control. Hopefully the title of this post will allow anyone experiencing similar problems to Google my solution! TinyMCE does a lot of javascript nastiness (from Watir’s perspective), turning a text […]
Big XML files, REXML and learning about stream parsers
June 27, 2007
After taking the easy route and building some XML check test scripts using Ruby and REXML’s DOM access, I decided that I really didn’t want my computer grinding to a halt for a whole day while it parsed a gig and a half of XML. So it was time to try a streaming parser. Unfortunately, […]
Ruby, windows, command lines and problems
June 6, 2007
I’ve been building tools for web service testing using Ruby and its SOAP libraries. I hope to write more on this later, but for now, a pointer to a simple problem that took up far too much time. My test toolkit has three small programs, each providing different services. The first can be passed a […]
Sorry!
April 17, 2007
I thought I was done with ranting about automation tools for a while, but I couldn’t resist this quote from my former boss’ blog: “Tools that let programmers create software by manipulating icons and graphics shapes on screen have a long and sometimes successful history… But these have generally served as layers of shortcuts on […]