Selenium Testing Architecture

Question

I am trying to optimize the current Automation testing we use for our application. We currently use a combination of Selenium and Cucumber.

Right now the layers we use are: TEST CASE -> SELENIUM -> Browser.

I have seen recommendations that its better to use TEST CASE -> FRAMEWORK -> SELENIUM -> BROWSER, that way when changes happen in the UI you only need to update the framework and not each test case.

The Question is our scripts are currently broken up into individual steps so when changes to UI happen we only update a script or two, is it better to use this approach with

• several scripts that execute for each test case

or go to the framework approach

• where the classes, methods, etc. reside in the framework and the test cases just call the methods with parameters for each step?

Answer 1

It depends on:

• the life cycle of your testing project, a project with a long life cycle is more worthy to develop a framework for than a short one.
• how often you need to update your test cases ( which in turn depends on how often those web pages under test change), a volatile webpage will demand its test scripts to be updated more regularly. Having a framework improves maintainability. (that is, if this framework is well written).

Introduce a framework has the following pros and cons:

• pros: easier maintenance, you no longer need to modify your code in multiple test cases, this will save your effort and time. And you get to re-use your framework over and over again for future projects, which will save you time and effort in a long run.
• cons: will have development overhead, extra money and effort are required to achieve it. If this project is small and short, the effort and money you spend on introducing a framework may even out-weight its benefits.