Post#2.Different Automation Testing Tools

Different Automation Testing Tools

Automatically testing your web application is a good way to ensure that new versions of your application don’t introduce bugs and regressions. Automation of your web application testing also allows your development team to make changes and refactor code with more confident, as they can quickly verify the functionality of the application after every change.

However, actually building automated tests for web applications can be challenging because the user interface of your application might change regularly, because of incompatibilities between browsers and because you usually need to support various server or client platforms. The following tools make it easier to build and execute automated tests for your web application.

Open Source Tools

Selenium – has arguably become the de facto test tool standard for a browser-based testing. Please remember: you cannot use selenium for non-browser applications; not everything can be an automation testing Selenium script. 

The first things folks usually think of when they hear automation testing is automation testing selenium. Remember Selenium is just for browser automation. Also, it’s not a tool its a library. Check out some of the other automation tools not named Selenium

Appium – Automation for apps. Appium seems to be the winner in the mobile testing space so far.

Watir – is an open source Ruby library for automating tests. Watir interacts with a browser the same way people do: clicking links, filling out forms and validating text.

Sikuli – What’s cool about SikuliX is that it allows you to automate anything you see on your screen using image-based testing.

WinAppDriver  – Windows Application Driver is a service to support UI Test Automation of Windows Applications

White Framework – White is a framework for automating rich client applications based on Win32, WinForms, WPF, Silverlight and SWT (Java) platforms. It’s .NET based and doesn’t require the use of any proprietary scripting languages. In fact, test automation programs using White support your writing with whatever .NET language, IDE and tools you are already using. White also provides a consistent, object-oriented API, hiding the complexity of Microsoft’s UIAutomation library (on which White is based) and Windows messages.

AutoIt – AutoIt v3 is a freeware BASIC-like scripting language designed for automating the Windows GUI and general scripting. Many teams integrate AutoIT with Selenium to work around non-browser windows that appear in an automated test workflow.

Serenity – One of my favorite automation frameworks around.  Serenity is a great open-source tool because it acts like a wrapper over Selenium and BDD tools like jBehave and Cucumber JVM. That means there’s a lot of built-in functionality available to you in Serenity that takes care of many things you would normally have to code from scratch if you had to create your own BDD framework. What Serenity is really awesome at is creating unbelievable reports. Out-of-the-box Serenity creates living documentation that can be used not only to view your Selenium BDD test results but also as documentation for your application.

Gauge – Gauge is a test automation solution that’s being built by ThoughtWorks; it’s cross platform and open-source. It supports multiple languages including Ruby, Java, C#, Python and Javascript, and it has upcoming support for other languages — like Golang — as well.

Sahi – The first thing you need to know is that Sahi comes in two flavors: open source and a pro version. Sahi Pro is the enterprise version of the open-source project. It includes lots of features coveted by larger organizations.

Robot Framework – If you want to use Python for your test automation efforts, you can’t go wrong using the Robot Framework. The Robot Framework is a mature solution that was created for testers and uses a keyword-driven approach to make tests readable and easy to create. It also has many test libraries and other tools you can use.

RedwoodHQ takes a little bit of a different approach from the other tools on this list. It creates a website interface that allows multiple testers to work together and run their tests from one web-accessible location.

Galen – If your automation efforts are focused on User Experience Design (UX)/Layout testing, Galen Framework might be a perfect fit for your needs.

Vendor-based Automation Test tools

Applitools – Actually Applitools integrates with both Vendor and Open-source solutions. If anyone has tried doing any sort of visual testing using tools like Eggplant and UFT Insight, you know how hard it is to make these types of tests reliable. Sometimes the tests are so fragile you can only run them on the same machine they were developed on to avoid flaky tests. There are many reasons for this, but it’s mostly due to pixels being slightly off from one browser or OS. Applitools is different in that it was developed from the ground up for visual validation and its sophisticated algorithm was designed to handle many pixel issues that most other image-based testing tools have a hard time handling. Applitools allows you to find and automatically detect all the visual bugs to validate the visual correctness of your application.

UFT LeanFT – Essentially combines the best of both the vendor-based and open-source worlds by morphing Selenium with some key functionality currently found in UFT (QTP).

Microsoft CodedUI – Actually uses Selenium to help test Chrome and Firefox browsers. But unlike Selenium, which is only for web-based testing, CodedUI is unique in that it allows you to automate a bunch of different technologies and is not limited to the browsers.

SmartBear Testcomplete – Allows you to automate web, desktop and mobile applications. Best of all, you can choose from script-free, drag & drop functionality or JavaScript, Python, VBScript, JScript, DelphiScript, C++Script or C#Script as a scripting language.

IBM Rational Functional Tester – Like most companies, IBM’s test portfolio has grown with the acquisition of tools like Rational and Green Hat. It appears that much of the strength of its functional test tools comes from its support of numerous technologies including Windows, Mac, and mobile platforms.

Tricentis – Self-billed as “the continuous testing company,” which is in line with Gartner’s finding that one of its strengths is its extensive efforts to support Agile testing and continuous improvement processes.

Worksoft – Worksoft is well known for its ERP business end-to-end solutions.

TestPlant – One of the few test automation tools listed that has strong support for Apple’s platform. In fact, because of its unique, image-based recognition approach, it has the ability to test hard-to-automate applications — especially those with object recognition issues. Unfortunately, anyone who has done image-based, functional test automation knows how difficult these types of tests can be to maintain, and some customers noted that as an issue.

Ranorex – Supports a ton of technologies across all kinds of platforms — all from one tool. Noteworthy, however, is that it lacks a full, end-to-end solution and focuses mainly on functional test automation.

Progress – For those of you who may not be familiar with this company, Progress recently acquired Telerik, which is the home of the popular free debugging tool Fiddler. Also I know a few test engineers who actually use Progress’s Test Studio as a front end for their Selenium test automation efforts. Strengths of Progress are its integration with Visual Studio and its supported languages.

Automation Anywhere – Does not support testing for packaged applications like SAP. Also lacks support for native mobile apps testing.

API Automation Test Tools

Open source API tools

Rest-Assured – Rest-Assured is an open-source Java Domain-specific language (DSL) that makes testing REST service simple. It simplifies things by eliminating the need to use boiler-plate code to test and validate complex responses. It also supports XML and JSON Request/Responses.

RestSharp – Simple REST and HTTP API Client for .NET

Postman – Postman is a rest client that started off as a Chrome browser plugin but recently came out with native versions for both Mac and Windows.

SoapUI – is the world leading Open Source Functional Testing tool for API Testing. It supports multiple protocols such as SOAP, REST, HTTP, JMS, AMF

Fiddler –  Fiddler is a tool that allows you to monitor, manipulate and reuse HTTP requests. Fiddler does many things that allow you to debug website issues, and with one of its many extensions you can accomplish even more.

Karate – Since Karate is built on top of Cucumber-JVM, you can run tests and generate reports like any standard Java project. But instead of Java – you write tests in a language designed to make dealing with HTTP, JSON or XML – simple.

Vendor API Tools

SoapUI Pro – Since the free version is open-source, you can actually gain access to the full source code and modify as needed. The pro version is more user-friendly, and has additional functionality including a form editor, an assertion wizard for xpath, and SQL query builder.

UFT API – In previous releases HP had separate products for functional testing. QuickTest Professional (QTP) was used for testing GUI applications, and Service Test was for testing non-GUI technologies. HP’s latest test tool release — Unified functional Testing (UFT) — combines both products and features a frontend that merges the separate tools into one common user interface.

Test Execution Report Tools

Allure – an open-source framework designed to create test execution reports clear to everyone in the team.

Run Your Automated Test in the Cloud or On Mobile Devices

Here are some vendors that allow you to save a ton of time by running your test in the cloud and on multiple OS, devices, and configuration. Get rid of the headache of having to maintain your own in-house lab/grid.

Sauce Labs

Perfecto

Browserstack

Zalenium – open-source Docker container grid solution

Automation Test Management Tools

Zephyr – Manage all aspects of software quality; integrate with JIRA and various test tools, foster collaboration and gain real-time visibility.

QaSymphony – Has a platform called qTest for Software testing and QA tools built for Agile