Selenium IDE

The Selenium IDE is an add-on to Firefox.

At a basic level it allows us to:

• Record user actions when browsing in Firefox

• Replay recorded scripts

• Convert recorded scripts into programming languages such as Java,Ruby, and more

• Add verification and synchronization steps to the script during the recording process

The IDE provides excellent support for writing automated test scripts in Selenium and gets better with every release. In this text we will focus on its use as an aid to writing automated test scripts in Java, rather than as a test tool in its own right.

For more information on Selenium IDE visit:

• Official documentation - http://seleniumhq.org/docs/03_selenium_ide.html

• Official Selenium IDE site - http://seleniumhq.org/projects/ide/

What is Firebug?

The firebug add-on lets us more easily inspect the web page to:

• explore the DOM,

• the element names and Ids,

• to see the Ajax calls being made and understand the functional flow of the web page

Basic Firebug Usage

Either search for it on the Firefox add-on directory (https://addons.mozilla.org/) or visit

http://www.getfirebug.com/ to install Firebug. As with all Firefox add-ons this will require a browser restart. Once installed you can access firebug from the Tools menu:

Firebug can also be displayed by clicking on the Firebug icon in the bottom right of the Firefox window.

When using firebug to help me with my Selenium testing I typically use the new “Inspect Element” option that you have when right clicking on an item in a web page.

If I use Google as an example then I can get the details of the Google input field by hovering the mouse over the input field. Then right clicking and selecting “Inspect Element”. This will open firebug in the “HTML view” and allow me to view the details of the HTML element

From this I can easily see the identifying attributes and surrounding elements that I can use in my Selenium tests. Experiment with the Firebug tool as it has a lot of very useful information and editing facilities that

can help with your testing.