headless browser

[Mahesh]

Hi Team,

we want to run the automated UI suite not launching the browser (i.e headless state) to ensure we can take advantage of running the tests nightly.

can any one help me understand how to do this.

 

Thanks in advance.

 

[Elena]

Hi Mahesh,

Thank you for your question. 

Though you should be informed that Test studio does not support headless browser test execution. There are certain limitations by Windows OS when tests contain real user simulation like real clicks, real typing, dialog handling, etc. Please note that these limitations concern any testing framework and is not limited to Test Studio only. 

Please let me know if you would need any further information. In case you would need further assistance to find the most suitable approach for running the test suite in the night I would like to kindly ask you for additional details. 

Thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation! 

Regards,
Elena Tsvetkova
Progress Telerik

 

 

[Lisa]

Elena, Selenium runs headless and does most of those tasks.

Right now our automation is at great risk of not running because this system doesn't run headless.

I'm not blaming you for not knowing this, but don't claim other automation systems that simulate real clicks don't run headless. It's just not true. It's an excuse Telerik is using to avoid having to support this very necessary feature.

[Elena]

Hi Lisa,

Please, excuse the inconvenience, that the lack of such functionality, may cause your team and you.

Still it is important to consider that Test Studio and the Testing Framework work and interact with the web applications in completely different way than Selenium do. Basically, Selenium uses JavaScript calls trough the WebDriver and actually, does not have the ability to simulate real user behavior in the way that Test Studio does. Thus, handling dialogs, like File Download and File Upload to/from specific locations, is becoming a challenge for Selenium and headless browsers in general. 

Moreover, when it comes to MS Windows and no active desktop session, the OS does not "draw Window" objects, so there is nothing for the "Mouse" and "Keyboard" to interact with. This is how headless browser test execution will be affected by OS limitations similar to these, which affects the test execution in an inactive desktop session. So, having a browser in UI-less mode is useful for JS unit tests and not for functional tests, which should verify how the web page behaves in terms of visual representation like dialogs, windows etc. And having all these specifics in mind, claiming that Selenium "works", simulating real user behavior in headless browser, is just not true.

I hope these details will be helpful for you to understand the concerns and limitations in front of Test Studio team in regards the headless browser support. 

Thank you for your understanding in advance. 

Regards,
Elena Tsvetkova
Progress Telerik

 

 

[Elena]

Hi everyone,

A couple of years later, though, I want to jump back to this discussion and share the good news headless execution in Chrome browser is implemented in the latest Test Studio 2021 R1 release - find the release notes here. 

Regards,
Elena
Progress Telerik