Selenium RC Questions & Answers

Question 1:

What is Selenium RC (also known as Selenium 1.0)?

Answer

Selenium RC is an offering from SeleniumHQ which tries to overcome following draw backs of Selenium IDE –

·         Able to execute tests only with Firefox

·         Not able to use full-fledged programming language and being limited to Selenese

Question 2:

What are the main components of Selenium RC?

Answer

Selenium RC has two primary components –

·         Client libraries which let you writes tests in language of your preference i.e. java, C#, perl, php etc

·         Selenium sever which acts as a proxy between browser and application under test (aut)

Question 3:

Why do I need Selenium Server?

Answer

Selenium uses java script to drives tests on a browser; Selenium injects its own js to the response which is returned from aut. But there is a java script security restriction (same origin policy) which lets you modify html of page using js only if js also originates from the same domain as html. This security restriction is of utmost important but spoils the working of Selenium. This is where Selenium server comes to play an important role.

Selenium server stands between aut and browser and injects selenium js to the response received from aut and then it is delivered to broswer. Hence browser believes that entire response was delivered from aut.

Question 4:

What is Selenium core? I have never used it!!!

Answer

Selenium core is the core js engine of Selenium which executes tests on browser, but because of same origin policy it needs to be deployed on app server itself, which is not always feasible. Hence Selenium core is not used in isolation. Selenium IDE as well as Selenium RC use Selenium core to drive tests while over coming same origin policy. In case of Selenium IDE tests are run in context of browser hence it is not hindered by same origin policy and with Selenium RC, Selenium Server over comes same origin policy.

Question 5:

Where is executable for Selenium RC, how do I install it?

Answer

Installation is a misnomer for Selenium RC. You don’t install Selenium RC you only add client libraries to you project. For example in case of java you add client driver and Selenium server jars in Eclipse or IntelliJ which are java editors.

Question 6:

I have downloaded Selenium Server and Client libraries, how do I start Selenium Server?

Answer

To start Selenium Server, you need to navigate to installation directory of Selenium server and execute following command –

Java -jar .jar

This will start Selenium server at port 4444 by default.

Notice that you need to have java version 1.5 or higher available on your system to be able to use Selenium server.

Question 7:

On my machine port 4444 is not freeL . How do Use another port?

Answer

You can specify port while running the selenium server as –

Java -jar .jar –port 5555

Question 8:

I am new to programming; can Selenium generate sample code from my Selenese scripts?

Answer

You can first record tests in Selenium IDE and then use format option to convert them in a language of your choice.

Question 9:

Can I start Selenium server from my program instead of command line

Answer

If you are using java then you can start Selenium server using SeleniumServer class. For this you need to instantiate SeleniumServer and then call start() method on it.

seleniumServer = new SeleniumServer();

seleniumServer.start();

Question 10:

And how do I start the browser?

Answer

While using java you need to create instance of DefaultSelenium class and pass it four parameters –

selenium = new DefaultSelenium(serverHost, serverPort, browser, appURL);

selenium.start();

Herein you need to pass,

host where Selenium server is running,

port of Selenium server,

browser where tests are to be executed and

application URL

Question 11:

I am not using java to program my tests, do I still have to install java on my system?

Answer

Yes, since Selenium server is written in java you need java to be installed on your system to be able to use it. Even though you might not be using java to program your tests.

Question 12:

What are the browsers offering from Selenium?

Answer

Following browsers could be used with Selenium –

*firefox

*firefoxproxy

*pifirefox

*chrome

*iexploreproxy

*iexplore

*firefox3

*safariproxy

*googlechrome

*konqueror

*firefox2

*safari

*piiexplore

*firefoxchrome

*opera

*iehta

*custom

Here pi and proxy stand for proxy injection mode of Selenium server

Question 13:

During execution of tests I see two browser windows; one my test application another window shows commands being executed. Can I limit it to just one window?

Answer

Yes you can instruct Selenium Server to launch just one window. To do so you must specify –singleWindow while starting the Selenium server as –

Java -jar .jar –singleWindow

Question 14:

My tests usually time outL. Can I specify bigger time out?

Answer

This usually happens while using open method with Selenium. One way to overcome this is to use setTimeOut method in your test script another way is to specify time out while starting Selenium server as following –

Java -jar .jar –timeout

Question 15:

My system is behind corporate network, how do I specify my corporate proxy?

Answer

You can specify your corporate proxy as following while starting Selenium Server –

java -jar .jar -Dhttp.proxyHost= -Dhttp.proxyPort= -Dhttp.proxyUser= -Dhttp.proxyPassword=

Question 16:

I am switching domains in my test scripts. I move from “yahoo.com” to “google.com” and my tests encounter  permission denied errorL

Answer

Changing domains is also a security restriction from java script. To overcome this you should start you Selenium server in proxy injection mode as –

java -jar .jar –proxyInjectionMode

Now Selenium server would act as proxy server for all the content going to test application

Question 17:

Can I execute my Selenese tests in another browser using Selenium server? I want to use only Selenese script my tests but still want to execute my test in non firefox browsers

Answer

Yes you can. To do so you need to specify following parameters while starting Selenium server –

Browser

Test domain

Path to html suite (you Selenese tests) and

Path to result

java -jar <>.jar -htmlSuite  

Question 18:

Can I log more options during test execution?

Answer

If you want to log browser side option during test execution then you should start Selenium server as following –

java -jar <>.jar –browserSideLog

Question 19:

Can I use Selenium RC on my UNIX/Mac also?

Answer

You can use Selenium RC on any system which is capable I running Java. Hence you can use it on RC and UNIX machines also

Question 20:

I want to test my scripts on new experimental browser, how do I do that?

Answer

You can specify *custom followed by path to browser to execute your tests on any browser while starting Selenium server

        *custom

Question 21:

I executed my tests cases but where is the test report?

Answer

Selenium RC itself does not provide any mechanism for test reporting. Test reporting is driven from the framework you use for Selenium. For example with java client driver of Selenium –

·         if you are using JUnit then you can use ant plug-in of JUnit to generate test report

·         if you are using TestNG then TestNG generates reports for you

Same reporting option is available with PHP unit and other client libraries you are using.

Question 22:

How do I use recovery scenarios with Selenium? I used to use them with QTP.

Answer

Power of recovery scenarios lies with the programming language you use. If you are using java then you can use Exception handling to overcome same. For example if you are reading data from a file and file is not available then you should keep you code statements in “try catch” block so that test execution could continue  even in the wake of errors. Such mechanism entirely boils down the errors you want to recover from, while being able to continue with test execution.

Question 23:

How do I iterate through options in my test script.

Answer

You can use loop features of the programming language, for example you can use “for” loop in java as following to type different test data in a text box –

// test data collection in an array

String[] testData = {"test1", "test2", "test3"};

// iterate through each test data

for (String s : testData) {

selenium.type(“elementLocator”, testData);

}

Question 24:

Can I execute java script from my tests? I want to count number of images on my page.

Answer

You can use method getEval() to evaluate java script. For example if you want to count number of images then you can pass following dom statement to getEval() as following –

selenium.getEval("window.document.images.length;");

Or to get All anchor objects from a page

selenium.getEval("window.document.getElementsByTagName(‘a’);");

Question 25:

Is there a way for me to know all available options when I start Selenium Server?

Answer

If you want to see all options available while starting Selenium server then you should use option “-h” while starting Selenium server -

Java –jar .jar –h

It would display you all the options which you can use while starting the Selenium server.

Question 26: 
I have created my own firefox profile; can I execute my test scripts on it 
Answer 
You may like to create your own firefox profile because Selenium always created a clean firefox profile while  executing the tests and none of your FF settings and plug-in are considered with this clean profile. If you want to execute tests on FF with your settings then you should create custom profile for FF.

To be able to execute tests on a custom firefox profile you should specify its path while starting Selenium server. For example if your new profile is stored at “awesome location” in your directory then you should start Selenium server as following –

Java –jar .jar -firefoxProfileTemplate   "awesome location"

Question 27:

How do I capture server side log from Selenium server?

Answer

Start your Selenium Server as following –

                      java -jar .jar -log selenium.log

And Selenium would start logging server side info, i.e.

20:44:25 DEBUG [12] org.openqa.selenium.server.SeleniumDriverResourceHandler -

Browser 12345/:top frame1 posted START NEW

Question 28:

What are Heightened Privileges Browsers?

Answer

Firefox and IE have browser modes which are not restricted by java script’s same origin policy. These browsers are known as browsers with elevated security privileges. In case of Firefox it is known as chrome (It’s not the Google browser) and in case of IE it is known as iehta

Question 29:

My application has lots of pop up window, how do I work with them?

Answer

You need to know the Window ID of pop window to be able to work with them.

First you need to bring control on pop up window; execute selenium commands there, close the pop up window and then bring control back to main window. Consider following example where click on an image brings a pop up window –

// click on image brings pop up window

selenium.click("css=img");

// wait for pop up window identified using anchor target "ss"

selenium.waitForPopUp("ss", getWaitPeriod());

selenium.selectWindow("ss");

// Some more operations on popup window

// Close the pop up window and Select the main application window

// Main window is selected by adding null as argument

selenium.close();

selenium.selectWindow("null");

// continue with usual operation J

Question 30:

While trying to execute my tests with firefox I encountered following error – “Firefox Refused Shutdown While Preparing a Profile”. How do I solve it?

Answer

This message simply means that Selenium is not able to launch FF browser as it is already running on your system. To overcome this you should close all running instances of FF browser.

You should also check your system process if there is any hidden FF profile running which is not visible on screen. You should kill all FF processes and following this your tests should run smooth

Question 31:

While trying to execute my tests with firefox I encountered following error – “Firefox Refused Shutdown While Preparing a Profile”. How do I solve it?

Answer

This message simply means that Selenium is not able to launch FF browser as it is already running on your system. To overcome this you should close all running instances of FF browser.

You should also check your system process if there is any hidden FF profile running which is not visible on screen. You should kill all FF processes and following this your tests should run smooth

Question 32:

My application uses Ajax heavily how do I use Selenium RC to work with Ajax operations?

Answer

Ajax operations don’t reload a page like normal form submission but they make http requests behind the scene. You cannot use waitForPageToLoad for such operations and instead should use conditional wait for change in state of application. This could as well mean waiting for presence of an element before continuing with test operations. Consider following example in which type operation triggers Ajax operation which is followed by conditional wait for presence of a text box –

// type operation brings element “q” on screen without loading the page

selenium.type("elementLocator", "testData");

// conditional wait for element “q”

for (int second = 0;; second++) {

if (second >= 60) fail("timeout");

try { if (selenium.isElementPresent("q")) break; } catch (Exception e) {}

Thread.sleep(1000);

}

Question 33:

How do I upload a file using Selenium? I need to upload a word file during test execution.

Answer

If you are using Firefox then you can use “type” command to type in a File Input box of upload file. But type operation does not work with IE and you would have to use “Robot” class in java to work make file upload work.

Question 34:

Why do I get “permission denied” error during execution of Selenium tests?

Answer

The primary reason of permission denied error is same origin policy restriction from java script. To overcome this error you can use browsers with elevated security privileges. In case of Firefox you should use  *chrome and in case of IE you should use *iehta as browser for working with Selenium.

Question 35:

I am not able to use “style” attribute to locate element with IE browserL

Answer

This is because IE expects attribute values to be in caps while other browsers expect it to be lower case letters. Hence

//tr[@style="background-color:yellow"] works with other browsers

//tr[@style="BACKGROUND-COLOUR:yellow"] works with IE

Question 36:

Are there any technical limitations while using Selenium RC?

Answer

Besides notorious “same origin policy” restriction from js, Selenium is also restricted from exercising anything which is outside browser. For example you cannot click on “Tools” option of your browser by just using Selenium.

Question 37:

But my tests need me to exercise objects outside browser, how do I achieve it?

Answer

You can use Robot class in java to achieve this, but it would be dirty solution even if you get through this.

Question 38:

Does Selenium have any offering for mobile browsers?

Answer

Selenium 2.0 (WebDriver) provides iPhone as well Android drivers which could be used to drive tests on mobile browsers

Question 39:

How does Selenium RC stand with other commercial tools?

Answer

The biggest advantage of Selenium RC is that it is absolutely free and has vast support of languages and browsers (almost always). Selenium lags when it comes to test reporting as Selenium does not have any in built reporting but this can be easily achieved using the programming language you decide to work on with Selenium. A bigger drawback is not being able to exercise objects which are outside browser window, for example clicking on folder on your desktop.

Question 40:

How does Selenium RC stand with other commercial tools?

Answer

The biggest advantage of Selenium RC is that it is absolutely free and has vast support of languages and browsers (almost always). Selenium lags when it comes to test reporting as Selenium does not have any in built reporting but this can be easily achieved

Question 41:

Can I just use Selenium RC to drive tests on two different browsers on one operating system without using Selenium Grid?

Answer

If you are using java client driver of Selenium then java testing framework TestNG lets you achieve this. You can set tests to be executed in parallel using “parallel=test” attribute and define two different tests, each using a different browser. Whole set up would look as (notice the highlighted sections for browser in test suite)–

xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

DOCTYPE suite SYSTEM "http://testng.org/testng-1.0.dtd" >

<suite name="Test Automation" verbose="10">

<parameter name="serverHost" value="localhost" />

<parameter name="appURL" value="http://tamil.yahoo.com"/>

<parameter name="proxyInjection" value="false" />

<parameter name="serverPort" value="4444"/>

<test name="Web Test1">

<parameter name="browser" value="*chrome" />

<parameter name="m" value="1">parameter>

<classes><class name="com.core.tests.TestClass1">class>classes>

test>

<test name="Web Test2">

<parameter name="browser" value="*iehta" />

<parameter name="m" value="2">parameter>

<classes><class name="com.core.tests.TestClass1"><class><classes>

<test>

<suite>