Selenium IDE refers to an integrated development environment (IDE) that helps in building Selenium tests. It enables users to make a record, edit, & debug Selenium tests in a simple-to-use interface. Furthermore, Selenium IDE is downloaded & installed as a browser extension for Chrome & Firefox.
Installing Selenium IDE for Chrome and Firefox
Steps to download & install Selenium IDE for Firefox:
- Go to Firefox & move to the Selenium IDE download page at the Firefox Add-ons site
- Click on the “Add to Firefox” button to download & install Selenium IDE.
- Firefox will request you approve the installation. Click on “Add” to confirm.
- After the installation is successful, the Selenium IDE icon will pop up in the Firefox toolbar.
Steps for Downloading & installing Selenium IDE for Chrome:
- Go to Chrome & navigate to the Selenium IDE download page at the Chrome Web Store
- Click on the “Add to Chrome” key for downloading & installing Selenium IDE.
- Chrome will request you approve the installation. Click on “Add extension” to approve.
- The moment the installation process is complete, the Selenium IDE icon will show on the Chrome toolbar.
Firefox DevTools in Firefox
Firefox DevTools refers to a set of tools for web development built into the Firefox web browser. It offers developers several tools & features for testing and debugging web applications.
Follow these easy steps below
- Go to Firefox web browser.
- Navigate to the webpage you need to test or debug.
- Right-click at any place on the webpage & choose “Inspect Element” from the context menu. Instead, press the F12 key to open DevTools.
- The DevTools panel opens at the right or bottom side of the Firefox window, reliant on your settings.
- DevTools panel comes with numerous tabs, including:
- Console: Enables one to operate JavaScript code & view console messages, warnings, and errors.
- Inspector: Enables you to view & edit the HTML & CSS code of a webpage.
- Debugger: This enables one to debug JavaScript code by setting breakpoints, inspecting variables, and stepping through code.
- Storage: enables one to view & edit cookies, session storage for a webpage, and local storage.
- Performance: Enables one to analyze the performance of a website like the load times & resource usage.
- Network: Enables one to monitor the network traffic of a webpage like the HTTP requests & responses.
- Accessibility: this enables one to test the accessibility of a webpage for customers with disabilities.
- Utilize the distinct tabs & tools to debug plus test your web app.
Firefox DevTools offers a powerful set of tools for web developers. Furthermore, it’s constantly evolving with new improvements and features. It also helps one to debug & optimize their web application to guarantee that it runs efficiently and smoothly.
Plugins
They are also known as add-ons or browser extensions and they are software programs that extend the functionality of a website browser. Plugins can be downloaded & installed from their browser’s third-party websites or official store
Plugins add a variety of features to a web browser like ad-blocking, language translators, password managers, social media sharing buttons, etc. They also are utilized to improve web development & testing like the Selenium IDE plugin for playing back and recording automated tests in Chrome and Firefox browsers.
However, it is significant to note that plugins also help introduce security risks to the browsing experience. Other plugins may get your personal information or track all your online activities, while others contain malware or other dangerous code that harms your computer or interferes with your privacy.
To guarantee a safe & secure browsing experience, it is recommended to install plugins from trusted sources only and to update them regularly to the latest versions. It’s a suitable practice to review the settings and permissions of each plugin before you install them, to be sure that they don’t have access to extra details than what’s necessary.
User Extensions
User extensions include custom JavaScript functions plus classes which could be added to Selenium IDE to lengthen its capabilities. They enable users to create their commands & do advanced operations which aren’t possible with in-built commands.
Furthermore, user extensions are added to Selenium IDE as external JavaScript files, that can be loaded by IDE utilizing the “Options” menu. The moment the user extensions are loaded, new commands can be utilized in Selenium IDE scripts same as in-built commands.
Other common examples of client extensions for Selenium IDE are:
- Browser-specific actions: Client extensions can be utilized to perform browser-specific actions like interacting with the browser’s native dialogs or getting access to the browser’s APIs.
- Data-driven testing: Client extensions can be utilized to read information from external sources, like databases or CSV files & utilize them to drive test cases.
- Assertions: Custom assertions are created to approve specific elements or features of a webpage.
- Custom wait conditions: Client extensions can be utilized to create a custom wait state that pauses the test script up to when a certain condition is met.
User extensions are a powerful tool that helps in creating improved test scripts in Selenium IDE. Moreover, it’s significant to ensure that extensions are maintained and tested to prevent any unexpected bugs or errors in the test scripts.
