Reuse existing firefox instance with selenium and capybara - selenium

currently during debug of test cases selenium is opening a new firefox window, in whatever desktop screen it chooses. I want to be able to have selenium attach to the existing window (and not close the window when the test is over.)
I see this in the selenium documentation
webdriver.firefox.useExisting Never use in production Use a running instance of firefox if one is present
but I do not see how to set it from rails/rspec/capybara
I have looked at the related SO answers, and they are more to do with attaching to a running test. I just want to control where the window is, and be able have the window open with the developer console, so we can see what is going on, and finally have the window stay open at the end of the test

Depends on the issue 2163 it was a feature of Selenium 1 and not implemented to Selenium 2 but still stays in documentation. Check this issue.

Related

How do I open a new private window in Selenium IDE and switch between windows?

I'm trying to make automated tests for a site, using Selenium IDE (not Selenium Server, RC, 2.0, and WebDriver).
I want to be logged in with user 1 in Firefox window 1 and open a Firefox private window to sign in with user 2. I need this because the website I want to test doesn't allow multiple users signed in in the same browser at the same time.
So:
1) Is there a way to open a private/incognito window?
2) How do I then switch back to the main window?
Here's how switching between simple windows looks like:
http://i.stack.imgur.com/P5bbt.png
In the attached image you can see how I solved the problem:
It works fine with Firefox version 42.0 (and earlier versions). With Firefox 43 I have some problems because "openWindow screen2" does not overwrite my window I open with javascript but opens an own window. I'm looking for a solution for this issue.
As far as I'm aware this isn't something that Selenium IDE can do. The best solution I can think of would be to use something like Autohotkey and combine the it with Selenium.
With AHK you can set a script to mimic the keyboard command to open a private window (ctrl+shift+p). When I've used it with selenium in the past I've set the AHK script to start when it detects a certain window title, and then had selenium call a javascript function from the user-extensions to amend the title of the page you're on to the title which will trigger the function when you need the AHK script to run. (Best not to use the default one, otherwise you could end up with countless private windows if it hits that page multiple times).
Try this,
FirefoxProfile firefoxProfile = new FirefoxProfile();
firefoxProfile.setPreference("browser.private.browsing.autostart",true);

Selenium IDE unable to open new windows from link when running through testcase

So I'm writing tests for a web page, and one of the tests include clicking a link, which opens a new window, do some assertions in that window, and jump back.
To open links I'm using the technique described here.
The weird thing is, when I go through the steps manually (just press all of them one after another) it works fine. But when I try to run the whole test, it either does nothing (no windows open) or it clicks another button (and not the link).
What can be the reason for it working when i do the steps manually, and not when Selenium IDE runs them for me?
To open link, you can use
click | link=link name
selectWindow | windowname
And then perform operation on that window

selenium webdriver stop working when click on different window

I'm using IE8 and webdriver.
The problem I have is every time webdriver runs I can't touch my computer. Basically the moment I click on a different window it stops working.
Because of this I can't run my code in debug mode with break point because I every time I go to Eclipse to manually execute the break point webdriver doesn't work anymore because IE8 is not selected.
With Firefox I'm able to do whatever I want but not with IE8. Is there anyway I can fix this problem with IE8?
Thank you!
The short answer is, "No, you can't fix this problem with IE at the moment." There are a number of reasons why window focus is incredibly important with the IE driver. The biggest reason is that you're using so-called "native events" when you're using the IE driver, which simulates mouse and keyboard events at the operating system level rather than just within the browser using, say, JavaScript, and the way IE processes native events is sometimes compromised if the browser window doesn't have focus. More information can be found in a presentation given at the 2012 Selenium Conference.
One approach to solving the problem would be to disable native events with the IE driver. Unfortunately, the simulated events aren't ready for normal use.

Why are Selenium IDE playback controls inactive? (How can I run recorded tests?)

I started learning how to use Selenium today. I have never used it before. I downloaded the Selenium IDE (1.0.10) plugin for FireFox (3.5.16). The way it's behaving is not matching up to the docs.
When I click the record button and perform actions in my browser, nothing happens in the IDE (nothing is recorded). (Actually, initially it did record, but now it doesn't) I tried restarting FireFox and that had no effect.
Also, the main controls are now inactive. I've included a screen shot to show what I mean by that. The controls remain inactive even it I click or double click on the name of a test case in the panel on the left.
And one final question -- it appears that a Selenium test case mentions Chrome in its default configuration even though the docs say you can only record tests using FireFox. Should I do anything about that?
If anyone can shed light on any of the above mysteries I would appreciate it. Thanks!
UPDATE
I restarted FireFox again and now it's recording actions, but the controls are still greyed-out as in the screenshot, so I can't play back the test.
The issue is that you are not in the HTML runner mode. The IDE has no concept of ruby or python or c# or Java. That is up to plugins which just essentially do a find an replace.
*chrome means Firefox Chrome. Something that has been around for a lot longer than Google Chrome the browser. It means use the browser chrome which removes a couple sandboxing issues.
If you want to play back the tests you can't go out of the table mode otherwise the IDE won't understand what to do. The code in the screenshot should be stored in a .rb file and that should be executed.
Let me try to unravel mysteries -
As soon as you launch the IDE it would be in recording mode. Do you see last Red button which is enabled.
IDE Tests can be executed only when in the selenese/html format (aka table format). I guess you have changed the format to ruby (I guess so), from Option > Format.
To be able to execute tests change it back to html from option > Format > HTML
Take my words, IDE is only and only for firefox

Unable to find popup window

I am having an issue with finding a popup window in some selenium test code. I am looking at the screen on the test runner and there are two IE windows, one of them is the popup and one of them the page which generated the popup. However selecting that window with
SelectWindow("name=SomeName")
fails. Putting a break point in there and running some diagnostics shows that
GetAllWindowNames()
returns only one window. Very odd. I have duplicated the problem in IE, chrome and firefox so I don't think it is browser specific. I am using C# to drive my tests. Any idea how I might solve this issue?
Edit:
I looked a bit more at how this page actually creates its popup by reloading itself with window.open added to its code. It is rather an odd way to open a popup but I don't see any reason why it isn't valid.
Is there title or some other attribute in popup window's source code? You can locate that using any info you find there. Try to record open popup window in Se IDE and click on something in that popup window. Usually this trick works.
IIRC, there are some situations where SElenium fails to register the window. In this case you can register the window anyway by using the openWindow(ยดยด, ). I think this is described in the explanation of openWindow in Selenijum IDE...