Selenium testing on the cloud is the most efficient way to scale up automated browser testing. This blog will help you get started with cross browser testing in Selenium.

Building large-scale web applications take a monumental effort. Testing the quality of these applications requires a whole other level of dedication. From a developer’s vantage point, the focus is on improving the feature set, speeding up the overall performance, and building a scalable product. As far as QA is concerned, a lot of focus is on usability testing and compatibility testing while testing a website or web application.

If you are building a consumer-facing website or web application, your product is likely to be accessed by users from across the globe. Your product must be tested on various combinations of web browsers, devices, and platforms (operating systems) to ensure top-notch performance. Hence, browser compatibility testing becomes even more critical. No one wants to lose potential customers because of unpleasant user experience on select few browsers, devices, or platforms.

The most economical & productive way to get this done is by implementing cloud-based automated browser testing or Selenium testing to be more precise. Wondering why it is the most efficient way? Allow me to dive deep into the importance of cross browser testing in Selenium.

TABLE OF CONTENT

• Limitations Of Local Testing
• Selenium: A Popular Alternative
• Getting Started With Selenium Testing On The Cloud
• Selenium Testing On The Cloud In Action

Limitations Of Local Testing

Responsive testing of a locally hosted website is the crux of successful online business. Developers prefer to test a website or web application locally before it goes live. It ensures that the website’s content is rendered according to the device used to access it. But the plethora of devices, viewports, or operating systems availed by users poses a significant challenge for coherent responsiveness.

It would require a significant investment to set up a local infrastructure on which testing can be performed. As you’ll need powerful machines with different combinations of operating systems and versions of web browsers (e.g., Chrome, Firefox, Safari, etc.) installed on them. There is a fairly slim chance that you can cover all the corner test-cases with automation testing on local machines. Thus, test coverage would likely take a huge hit.

On the other hand, the Selenium test framework provides a means to perform widespread automated browser testing. Rather than investing in non-scalable test infrastructure, Selenium testing on the cloud could be leveraged for long-term gains.

Selenium: A Popular Alternative

Selenium is a very popular test framework using which you can create scalable test cases for automated browser testing or cross browser testing. It is an open-source framework that automates a browser to behave like a user is expected to interact with your website. You can write test scripts in many languages, including but not limited to Java, Python, PHP, Ruby, C#, etc.

A Detailed Study on What is Selenium?

There are innumerable factors that can be attributed to the popularity of the Selenium framework; the major ones are mentioned below:

• Selenium is open-source, and its usage does not involve any overhead costs.
• Popular programming languages like C#, Python, JavaScript, Ruby on Rails, etc. can be used seamlessly with the Selenium framework.
• Selenium has a vast support community to help you out of a sticky situation. This community is growing every single day.
• WebDrivers for popular web browsers like Chrome, Firefox, Microsoft Edge, etc. can be downloaded to automate GUI tests.
• Popular frameworks like Hypothesis, Robot Framework, etc. (for Python) can perform testing using a wide range of input values.

Merits Of Selenium Testing On The Cloud

Automated browser testing on local infrastructure is neither economical nor scalable. Even if you are willing to invest heavily in the overall infrastructure, you will not achieve the same quality of throughput, test performance, parallelism, test coverage, etc. that you are likely to accomplish with cross browser testing in Selenium.

Below are some of the most important benefits of switching to Selenium testing on the cloud:

• Achieve better browser coverage, platform coverage, and test coverage by executing automation tests on cloud-based cross browser testing platforms.
• Scalable and cost-effective as you pay for the resources that you use. It works on a SAAS (Software as a service) model.
• Execute automation tests at a faster pace by leveraging the power of parallel testing.
• Use browser capabilities to test on new as well as outdated/old web browsers, operating systems, and devices.
• Use popular programming languages like C#, JavaScript, Ruby on Rails, Python, etc. along with the Selenium test framework, i.e. remote Selenium WebDriver for scalable development test cases/test suites.
• Keep track of the testing process’s evolution and take advantage of bug-tracking, communication, and project management tools for tracking & timely communication with other team members.
• Leverage the advantage of CI/CD (Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery) tools like Jenkins, TeamCity, Travis, Bamboo, etc. to achieve automation of the build, package, and testing processes.

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