Using a Page Object

Intro

One of the biggest challenges with Selenium tests is that they can be brittle and challenging to maintain over time. This is largely due to the fact that things in the app you're testing change, breaking your tests.

But the reality of a software project is that change is a constant. So we need to account for this reality somehow in our test code in order to be successful.

A Solution

Enter Page Objects.

Rather than write your test code directly against your app, you can model the behavior of your application into simple objects -- and write your tests against them instead. That way when your app changes and your tests break, you only have to update your test code in one place to fix it.

And with this approach, we not only get the benefit of controlled chaos, we also get the benefit of reusable behavior.

About The Author

Dave Haeffner is the original writer of Elemental Selenium -- a free, once weekly Selenium tip newsletter that's read by thousands of testing professionals. He also created and maintains the-internet (an open-source web app that's perfect for writing automated tests against).

Dave has helped numerous companies successfully implement automated acceptance testing; including The Motley Fool, ManTech International, Sittercity, and Animoto. He is also an active member of the Selenium project and has spoken at numerous conferences and meetups around the world about automated acceptance testing.