Is the popularity of the suite of Selenium tools enough of a reason to use it over other tools?
When we talk about automation testing, Selenium always finds its way to the conversation. Being one of the best tools for automation testing, Selenium is well loved by developers and testers across the globe. But the question that remains is that there are many automation testing tools available in the market that delivers almost the same results. So, why only Selenium?
Well, this is something that we are going to discuss in detail in the article. By the end of the article, you will be able to list out all the benefits of performing automation testing using Selenium and why is it preferred over other automation testing tools.
What is Selenium?
Before we delve deep in the benefits of let us first understand what Selenium is and why it is used.
Well, Selenium is an open-source automation testing tool which is used for automating tests carried out on different web-browsers.
It has a suite of tools which caters to different needs of organizations. It basically has four different tools:
Selenium RC (which is now deprecated)
Selenium IDE (Selenium Integrated Development Environment)
Selenium Grid
Selenium WebDriver
Currently, Selenium WebDriver and Grid are merged into one and this is what we’ll be talking about in this article.
Why is Selenium Used?
Selenium is basically used to automate the testing across various web browsers. It supports various browsers like Chrome, Mozilla, Firefox, Safari, and IE, and you can very easily automate browser testing across these browsers using Selenium WebDriver.
You can see live automated tests being performed on your computer screen. But the question that we’ll be answering in this article still stands as there are many tools available for automation testing.
Let’s see what Selenium has to offer us to win this game.
Advantages of Using Selenium for Automated Testing
1. Language and Framework Support
When someone chooses a tool the first thing that comes to mind is: "Does my tool supports the language that I know?"
Well, this is not the case with Selenium as it supports all major languages like Java, Python, JavaScript, C#, Ruby, and Perl programming languages for software test automation.
You can write your scripts in any of these programming languages and Selenium converts it into Selenium compatible codes in no time. So, there is no need for knowing Selenium only languages. Also, every Selenium supported language has dedicated frameworks which help in writing test script for Selenium test automation. So, when you go for Selenium as a tool for performing automation testing, you don’t have to worry about language and framework support as Selenium does that for you!
2. Open Source Availability
One of the many things that adds to the advantages of Selenium is its open source availability. So, being an open source tool, Selenium is a publicly accessible automation framework and is free, with no upfront costs. So, you can save bucks here and use them for other good causes.
The Selenium community is continuously helping developers and software engineers in automating the web browser features and functionalities. Selenium being open source also helps you customize the code for better code management and enhance the functionality of predefined functions and classes. Selenium has become the most reliable web automation tool because of the ease of generating test scripts to validate functionality.
3. Multi-Browser Support
“One Selenium script for all browsers” is what Selenium community have been working on and improvising every day. As per StatCounter, Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, Opera, and Edge browsers are the most used browsers worldwide and Selenium script is compatible with all the mentioned browsers. You don’t need to rewrite scripts for every browser, just one script for all browsers.
4. Support Across Various Operating Systems
Different people use different operating systems and it is necessary that your automation tool supports all of them. Selenium is yet a highly portable tool that supports and can work across different operating systems like Windows, Linux, Mac OS, UNIX, etc.
You can create Selenium test suites over any platform like Windows and can execute the same test suite on another platform, for example, Mac or Linux. This enables developers and software testers to easily write test automation scripts without laying much emphasis on the platform on which it will run.
5. Ease Of Implementation
Selenium automation framework is very easy-to-use tool. Selenium provides a user-friendly interface that helps create and execute test scripts easily and effectively. You can also watch while tests are running. You can analyze detailed reports of Selenium tests and take follow-up actions.
And finally, you will never feel alone. A huge Selenium community is always available to help you in case of need. You can ask your queries and perform brainstorming in the community.
6. Reusability and Integrations
As mentioned earlier, Selenium automation test suites are reusable and can be tested across multiple browsers and operating systems. However, the twist is if that Selenium is not an all-inclusive web automation testing tool. Hence, it needs third-party frameworks and add-ons to broaden the scope of testing.
For example, you need to integrate Selenium with TestNG and JUnit for managing test cases and generating reports. For achieving continuous testing, you’ll need to integrate it with some CI/CD tools like Jenkins, Maven, and Docker. Also, for performing image-based testing, you need to integrate Selenium with tools like Sikuli, and for performing cross-browser testing with cloud-grid such as LambdaTest. You can integrate Selenium with almost all management tools.
7. Flexibility
Test management is what which is very important in testing lifecycle. It becomes easier and more efficient with Selenium features like regrouping and refactoring of test cases. This helps developers and testers in quick changes to the code, reducing duplication, minimizing complications and improving maintainability. These features make Selenium more flexible and usable as compared to other automation testing tools and hence helps Selenium to keep an edge.
8. Parallel Test Execution and Faster Go-to-Market
The main aim of automated testing is to save time and efforts. With the help of Selenium Grid, we can execute multiple tests in parallel, hence reducing the test execution time. With the help of cloud-grids for cross-browser testing you can test across as many as hundreds of browsers in parallel using Selenium hence saving you time in multiples of hundreds.
9. Less Hardware Usage
If you compare Selenium with other vendor focused automation tools like QTP, UFT, SilkTest, you will find that Selenium requires less hardware as compared to other testing tools.
10. Easy to Learn and Use
Selenium scripts are not something like writing hundred-page complex algorithm. Writing Selenium scripts is not more than writing a few pieces of codes to automate functionalities of your website. Also, documentation on the Selenium website is very helpful for developer and testers to start with Selenium automation testing. With the radically growing community, Selenium tutorials, testing, and development support is just a Google search away.
Also with Selenium IDE extension on Firefox browser, you can use record and play functionality to generate Selenium scripts for future reference.
11. Constant Updates
As Selenium is supported by a community and we all know that an active community doesn’t like to stay stagnant, the Selenium community is also constantly releasing constant updates and upgrades. The best part about having a community is that these upgrades are readily available and easy to understand hence you do not need any specific training. This makes Selenium resourceful as compared to other tools and cost-effective as well.
Ending Note
We all know we are very selective when it comes to selecting anything from a lot of options. When it comes to selecting a tool we become even much more selective, hence you can take your chance here. When you perform automation testing, you’ll find a variety of tools to help you. But why choose Selenium? Well, I must say, decide for yourself?
Original Source: Dzone.com
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