So the better half of me(no, I am still single!), the tester has woken up and here are some random thoughts about automated testing tools.

Coming from an Automated Testing background, I always find it interesting to try out new automation testing tools. I have used Rational Functional Tester, SilkTest, Rational Robot. Recently Watir and Selenium was also added to my Automated Testing skills.

Past
For products like RationalRobot, SilkTest, QTP, there was always a steep learning curve because of the proprietary languages they use to support for coding.Rational Functional Tester(formally known as Rational XDE Tester) received a warm welcome by the community because of Java being the langauge to code in for tests.

Recent Past
Then came some keyword driven approaches(SAFS), which added a layer of abstraction over these automated tools,which end-users to type in the automated tests from spreadsheets once developers have a built a test automation framework in place.

Present
Thanks to AJAX, automated testing has become a tougher challenge now. with inline popups, dynamic asynchronous requests springing up everywhere.

Tools like Watir and Selenium came to the rescue. they have been there unnoticed from sometime, but now thanks to opensource, they are now getting much deserved attention.

I recently used Watir and Selenium and was amazed by the ease of use that they provide. Both of them provide DSL like implementation with their commands(Ruby selenese for selenium). About selenium, I particularly liked the idea of cross-platform and cross-browser compatibility.

In coming days I am going to try out selenium extensively and will try to gauge its level of support for problems faced by traditional automated tools.