Origin of Selenium

Jason Huggins developed the testing tool called Selenium in the year of 2004. To perform repetitive testing against the web-based applications, he developed a JavaScript, and later the name was changed as Selenium. Earlier the name of the program is called as “JavaScript Runner”        

Why Selenium?

Various companies are spending lots of money to buy an automation tool for testing but Selenium will be available for free downloads because of the open-source concept. 

Some other tools which are available for automation testing are based on pricing and for some features, we have to enable the upgrade version by paying. In this case, Selenium stands one step ahead. 

Anyone can download the latest version of the software from the selenium website. It’s not only an open-source tool but also can be modified by their needs. Testers can make changes based on their needs and requirements.

The above-mentioned points make it more feasible among the companies looking for skilled selenium testers. To become a skilled selenium tester, Join Software Testing Training Institute In Chennai. You can play in and around testing by learning all the side codes of selenium.

Selenium is for Automation Testing

Selenium is an open-source testing tool that allows you to test the performance of the web-based application. The core feature of selenium is to test the ability beyond cross browsers testing and various operating systems. The important part of selenium will be divided into 4 types

1. Selenium IDE
2. Selenium RC
3. Web Driver
4. Selenium Grid

Selenium Testing Suite

Selenium IDE, Selenium RC, Selenium Web-driver, Selenium Grid are called Selenium Testing Suite. After knowing the benefits of testing suites, selenium has become the most popular testing tool for automation. 

Selenium testing has reduced the time and the cost to achieve performance goals. To test the GUI and the web application, it’ll be their first choice for the testers to test.

1. Selenium IDE

The full form of Selenium IDE is the Selenium Integrated Development Environment, which is one of the simplest frameworks in the selenium testing suite and it’s the easiest one to learn for beginners. IDE is the Firefox Plugin, so you can easily install it like other plugins. 

Because of the simplicity of IDE, it can be only used as the “Prototyping Tool”. In case, if you want to create more advanced test cases, then you should try for Selenium RC or Selenium WebDrivers.

PROS and CONS:

1. Easy to use and install → Available only in Firefox
2. No Programming Knowledge required → Designed only to create prototypes of test cases
3. Has build-in test formats usable in Selenium RC and Selenium Webdriver → Test execution is very slow when it’s compared to Selenium RC and Selenium Web Driver.

2. Selenium RC (Remote Control)

Selenium RC was the flagship framework of testing for the whole selenium projects for a long time. This is the first automated web testing tool that allows the user to use their preferred languages they want. As of now version of 2.25.0, Selenium RC can support the below-mentioned languages,

• Java
• C#
• PHP
• Python
• Perl
• Ruby

PROS and CONS:

1. It can perform cross-browser and cross-platform testing → Installation is way more complicated than IDE.
2. Supports Data-Driven testing → Needs selenium RC server to run.
3. Faster exception than IDE → But slower execution when it’s compared to web drivers.

3. Selenium Web-driver

Selenium Web-driver is the successful tool after Selenium RC and so far it is one of the most important parts of Selenium Testing Suite. Selenium web driver provides you the programming interface to create and execute the test cases based on the requirements. 

Testing scripts are written to recognize the web elements and then desired steps are performed on those written web elements.

Webdriver calls the method directly to different browsers hence the selenium web driver has separate drivers for each browser. Some of the most used web drivers are mentioned below,

• Mozilla Firefox (Gecko Driver)
• Google Chrome Driver
• Internet Explorer Driver
• Opera Driver
• Safari Driver
• HTML Unit Driver     

PROS and CONS

1. Simple installation when it’s compared to Selenium RC → But it’s more complicated than IDE 
2. Communicates directly to the web browsers → But it requires the programming knowledge
3. No need for separate components like the RC server → Has no build-in mechanism for logging runtime messages and generates test results.

4. Selenium Grid

Selenium grid is also an important part of the selenium suite which allows you to run the test cases on different machines against different browsers in parallel. In other words, we can run our test cases in different machines running in different browsers and operating systems.

Selenium Grid goes along with the HOB-NODE Architecture to attain the parallel execution of test scripts. Hub controls the execution of the test scripts on various nodes. 

Advantages and Disadvantages of Selenium

         Advantages: 

1. Selenium is an open-source software testing tool
2. Selenium supports various languages to create and execute programs.
3. Selenium supports various kind of browsers (Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, IE, Opera, Safari)
4. Selenium supports parallel test case execution
5. Selenium supports various operating systems (Windows, Linux, etc)

         Disadvantages:

1. There is no technical support from anybody but UFT provides technical support from HP
2. It supports only web-based applications
3. There is limited support for image testing
4. No Build-In report facility
5. No testing tool integrated for test management

How to Join a Selenium Course?

Nowadays beginners or experts should know about automation testing to survive in this field. For automation testing, most of the companies are preferring selenium tools. So try to search Software Testing Courses In Chennai for certified courses. Get yourself joined in a reputed Selenium training center to shine as a successful tester in the automation field.