GUI Testing [closed]

Answer 1

For SIMPLE Web based GUI testing try iMacros ( a simple Firefox plug-in , has a cool feature to send the entire test to another person ) Note that SIMPLE was spelled with Initials ...

Answer 2

Don't miss the 'U' in 'GUI'
I mean: if what you're trying to test is all works right and works as it was planned to work, then you may follow Seb Rose's answer.

But please, don't forget a USER interface has to be made thinking about USERS, and not ANY user but the TARGET USER the application was made for. So, after you are sure all works like it have to work, put every single view/screen/form in a test with a team made of users representing every group of different users that may use your application: advanced users, administrators, MS Office users, low computer profile users, high computer profile users... and then, get the critiques of every user, make a mix, re-touch your GUI if it's neccesary and back again to GUI user's test.

Answer 3

You have (at least) 2 issues - the complexity of the environment (the server) and the complexity of the GUI.

There are many tools for automating GUI testing. All of them are more or less fragile and require pretty much constant maintenance in the face of changing layout. There is benefit to be gained from using them, but it's a long term benefit.

The environment, on the other hand, is an area that can be tamed. If your application is architected using the Dependency Injection/Inversion technique (where you 'inject' the server component into the application), then you can use a 'mock' of the relevant server interfaces to enable you to script test cases.

Combining these two techniques will allow you to automate GUI testing.

One final thought - good luck!

Answer 4

If your application is web-based you can write tests using tools like WatiN or Selenium.

If your application is Windows .NET based, you could try White.

Answer 5

We do incorporate GUI testing in our project, and it has its side effects. The developers however have one critical design principle: Keep the GUI layer as thin as possible!

That means no logic in the GUI classes. Separate this in presentation models responsible for input validation etc.

For testing on a Unix machine we use the Xvfb server as the DISPLAY when running the tests.

Answer 6

Other GUI-testing tools I can offer are: Thoughtworks White, PyWinAuto, AutoIt, AutoHotKey.

One thing to keep in mind when trying to automate GUIs is that the only way you can do that is to build the GUI with automation in mind. Crush devs that think their GUIs should not support testability early on in the project and happily expose all the hooks that can help in automation on demand as your testing needs require that.