Getting Started with Selenium WebDriver

Table of Contents

• 1. Selenium and Selenium Web Driver
• 2. Setting-Up the Environment
• 3. Test Script with Selenium Web Driver
  • 3.1) Creating a project
  • 3.2) Creating a Class
• 4. Code a Simple Selenium Script
• 5. Running the test

Testing is a critical step in the Software Development Life Cycle. Software testing helps to ensure the quality and effectiveness of the final product.

Automated Functional testing automates the process of testing and validating each functionality in the software through the execution of pre-defined Automation scripts. This is mainly done for test cases that need to be repeated and are tedious to perform manually.

1. Selenium and Selenium Web Driver?

Selenium is a collection of specialized tools for automating the testing process of web-based applications. This free and open-source tool can be used across different browsers and platforms.

Selenium Web driver is a browser automated framework and accepts written scripts and controls browsers directly. Furthermore, it supports test scripts written in several different languages such as Java, JavaScript, PHP, Python, and C#.

2. Setting-Up the Environment

The following prerequisites must be satisfied to create and run automated test scripts using Selenium.

3. Test Script with Selenium Web Driver

3.1) Creating a project

1. Launch Eclipse from the Start Menu or by double-clicking “eclipse.exe” in the folder “eclipse” where it was installed.
2. To create a new Project, go to File > New and select

3. Now name the project. I’ll be using “FirstWebDriverProject‘.

4. Then click “Finish”. The project will be created and displayed in the Package Explorer.

5. Right-click the project and select New >Package

6. Name the package “newPackage” and click Finish.

3.2) Creating a Class

1. Right-click on the package and select New > Class.

2. Give the name ‘myClass’ and click Finish.

4. Code a Simple Selenium Script

We will now use the new Class to write a script in Selenium Web Driver using Firefox. It will fetch the site https://www.airbnb.com/, verify the title, print out the result and close the browser.

package newPackage;

import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.firefox.FirefoxDriver;

public class myClass {

   public static void main(String[]args) throws InterruptedException{
      System.setProperty("webdriver.gecko.driver", "C:\\geckodriver\\geckodriver.exe");
      
      WebDriver driver = new FirefoxDriver();
      
      String baseUrl = "https://www.airbnb.com/";
        String expectedTitle = "Vacation Rentals, Homes, Experiences & Places - Airbnb";
        String actualTitle="";
      driver.get(baseUrl);
      actualTitle = driver.getTitle();
      if (actualTitle.contentEquals(expectedTitle)){
         System.out.println("Test Passed!");

         } else {

         System.out.println("Test Failed");}	 
      driver.close();
      System.exit(0);
   }
   
}

Let’s analyse and understand this code in bit detail:

if (actualTitle.contentEquals(expectedTitle)) {

System.out.println("Test Passed!");

} else {

System.out.println("Test Failed");}

5. Running the test

To run the test script, click Run > Run in the Eclipse menu. Alternatively, you can press Ctrl + F11.

Once everything is done Eclipse will print out the result in its console.

This is just a simple example. There is a lot more that can be done with Selenium. Use this example as the beginning of your Selenium journey!