Selenium has for long been a preferred open-source tool for the automation of tests that are carried out on web browsers. One of the reasons why Selenium has been so popular as a dynamic web application testing automation tool is that it does not involve any licensing cost. However, that is not the only advantage of Selenium automation. Before knowing its many advantages, here are some facts about how Selenium came into being and everything else pertaining to this open-source tool that you should know.
- Why Was Selenium Developed?
Selenium being an automation tool for testing, the apparent reason why it was developed was to overcome the hassle of manual testing. Before Selenium, the web applications were tested manually, which involved QA testers and experts. This involved working with a bunch of data sets and recording the success or failure rate of each transaction. The manual process of testing web applications had massive shortcomings and challenges ranging from being tedious, time-consuming, and even prone to mistakes and errors. Delay in completing the testing process was common, and this is how the idea of an automated testing tool was thought of. And this is why Selenium was invented.
- Why Do You Need Selenium Automation Testing?
As mentioned earlier, the whole process of manual testing can be time-consuming and boring. And when you don’t have the manpower to run a manual test, it can even take weeks of hard work and paying attention to each and every tiny detail to make sure that the results are error-free. If you would like to eliminate these errors and make the process a lot easier and more convenient despite having only a few experts to handle the process, Selenium automation testing is the solution.
- What Types of Testing Can Selenium be Used For?
Selenium testing can be used for compatibility testing that is conducted to make sure that the performance benchmarks on various browser-OS combinations are met. It can also be used for performance testing wherein it is checked if the web application is in compliance with the benchmarks of performance as set by stakeholders. End-to-end testing uses Selenium automation for verifying the functionality of all the web application touchpoints. And you can also leverage Selenium automation for regression testing. This is conducted to check if the new features that are designed are compatible with the existing system. Besides these testing types, Selenium is also widely used for system testing and integration testing.
- What Do You Need for Selenium Automation?
When you intend to use Selenium to automate the testing of your web application, the good news is that you don’t have to download Selenium like you would download any software. Instead, you need certain components of Selenium for running tests on your device.
- Can Selenium Be Used for All Browsers?
While initially, Selenium was only compatible with a few browsers, times have changed. Ever since Selenium was open-sourced, various third-party drivers have been added that make it possible to use Selenium on browsers such as Safari, Chrome, Opera, Firefox, Blackberry 10, among others. So, all you have to do is check if the browser that you plan to use Selenium automation on has built-in support for automation testing using Selenium.
- Advantages of Using Selenium
One of the main advantages of using Selenium is that it offers flexibility in testing. You can easily work with test scripts written in a variety of programming languages such as python, java, ruby, perl, C, PHP, among various others. And most popular and common operating systems such as Windows, Linux, and Mac allow you to carry out tests using Selenium. And as mentioned above, the most commonly used web browsers have built-in support for Selenium automation testing. What’s more, is that you can generate reports as well as manage test cases by integrating Selenium with other useful and handy tools such as JUnit and TestNG. And for continuous testing, you can even integrate it with Jenkins, Docker, and Maven.
Every machine in today’s day and age is controlled by software. and to make sure that these complex machines behave just as you would want them to, you need to ensure that the software is tested and perfected. This is where something like Selenium automation testing proves to be immensely beneficial. Not only does it save you the time and effort that would otherwise be involved in manual testing, but it also helps eliminate inconsistencies in the process and saves you from making mistakes. And with that, it ensures that your software testing process is flawless, which decides the growth of your business.
