Slides from my talk at Selenium Conference Chicago 2018

1. Knowing your Automation
Hugh McCamphill

2. Organiser Belfast Selenium Meetup
Co-organiser SWTC Belfast
Lead Test Engineer at ShopKeep
Twitter: @hughleo01
About Me

3. @hughleo01
● Provides a common language
or model to work with
● Hides complexity / remove
unimportant detail
● Get to work at a level closer to
the problem being solved.
Abstraction

4. @hughleo01
Test Automation Abstractions
● For example
○ Webdriver
○ Web Elements
○ Page Objects
● Useful with automation because
○ Change implementation
○ Makes automation more maintainable
https://www.slideshare.net/eviltester/automation-abstraction-layers-page-objectspdf

5. @hughleo01
All non-trivial abstractions,
to some degree, are leaky
Joel Spolsky

6. History is a wheel,
for the nature of
man is
fundamentally
unchanging
https://www.flickr.com/photos/coast_guard/7074680433/

7. @hughleo01

8. @hughleo01

9. @hughleo01
Pro: Anyone can write automation
Con: Anyone can write automation

10. @hughleo01
Anyone can write automation
Removed from the code - what happens when something goes wrong?

11. @hughleo01
“There’s a
tool for
every task
and a task
for every
tool”

12. @hughleo01

13. @hughleo01
“I’M A SLOW LEARNER IT’S TRUE.
BUT I LEARN”

14. Test
Page Objects
Webdriver

15. @hughleo01
“SUDDENLY YOUR
JOY WILL TURN TO
ASHES IN YOUR
MOUTH”

16. Test
Page Objects
Webdriver
Wrapper

17. @hughleo01

18. @hughleo01
With Capybara, entering a value in an input field
can spawn five Selenium commands:
● verifying that the element is displayed
● getting its name
● determining its type
● clearing it
● then entering the text.
Every call is an RPC call
http://www.aosabook.org/en/selenium.html
https://wiki.saucelabs.com/display/DOCS/
Tips+for+Lean%2C+Speedy+Tests+with+
Sauce+Labs

19. @hughleo01

20. @hughleo01
“THE MAN WHO
PASSES THE SENTENCE
SHOULD SWING
THE SWORD”

21. @hughleo01
● Finding the same element each time
● Conditional logic of element existing
Every call is an RPC call

22. @hughleo01
“Knowledge is a weapon, Jon. Arm yourself
well before you ride forth to battle”
Composition over inheritance
Domain Objects
Builder Pattern
Interaction Abstractions

23. @hughleo01

24. @hughleo01
Domain Object

25. @hughleo01
Builders

26. @hughleo01
Builders

27. @hughleo01
Interaction Abstractions

28. @hughleo01
Selenide example
Interaction Abstractions

29. “What is dead may never die,
but rises again,
stronger and harder.”
SGPhotography77 on Visualhunt.com / CC

30. @hughleo01
Smart
Selectors
Self-healing
tests
Codeless
Maintenance
freeAutomate
manual testingNo Coding
Required
Photo credit: Rennett Stowe on Visualhunt.com / CC BY
Never type a
single line of
code
No need to learn
new languages or
tools
We look up at the same stars, and see such different things.

31. @hughleo01
“It’s easy to
confuse
what is with WHAT
ought
to be, especially
when
what is has
worked
out in your
favour”

32. @hughleo01
MY WATCH HAS ENDED

33. @hughleo01
References
https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/11/11/the-law-of-lea
ky-abstractions/
https://www.slideshare.net/alimenkou/dsl-page-object-and-s
elenium-a-way-to-reliable-functional-tests
https://www.slideshare.net/eviltester/automation-abstractio
n-layers-page-objectspdf
https://dojo.ministryoftesting.com/dojo/lessons/automation-
time-to-change-our-models-iain-mccowatt?s_id=14209