Skip to content

Authoring Your Own Test Script

Jump to bottom
Hassan Uraizee edited this page Jun 20, 2019 · 2 revisions

You can choose any programming language or tools supported by Appium/Selenium to write your test scripts. In the example below, we will author the test script in C# using Microsoft Visual Studio.

Creating a Test Project

  1. Open Microsoft Visual Studio 2015 or Microsoft Visual Studio 2017

    Note: in Visual Studio 2017 make sure you have the optional .NET desktop development workload installed

  2. Create the test project and solution. I.e. Select New Project > Templates > Visual C# > Test > Unit Test Project
  3. Once created, select Project > Manage NuGet Packages... > Browse and search for Appium.WebDriver
  4. Install the Appium.WebDriver NuGet packages for the test project
  5. Start writing your test (see sample code under samples)

Testing a Universal Windows Platform Application

To test a UWP app, simply specify the Application Id for the application you want to test in the app capabilities entry when you are creating a session. You can also specify launching arguments if your application supports them through appArguments capability. Below is an example of creating a test session for Windows Alarms & Clock app written in C#:

// Launch the Alarms & Clock app
DesiredCapabilities appCapabilities = new DesiredCapabilities();
appCapabilities.SetCapability("app", "Microsoft.WindowsAlarms_8wekyb3d8bbwe!App");
AlarmClockSession = new WindowsDriver<WindowsElement>(new Uri("http://127.0.0.1:4723"), appCapabilities);

// Use the session to control the app
AlarmClockSession.FindElementByAccessibilityId("AddAlarmButton").Click();
AlarmClockSession.FindElementByAccessibilityId("AlarmNameTextBox").Clear();

You can find the Application Id of your application in the generated AppX\vs.appxrecipe file under RegisteredUserModeAppID node. E.g. c24c8163-548e-4b84-a466-530178fc0580_scyf5npe3hv32!App

Testing a Classic Windows Application

To test a classic Windows app, specify the full executable path for the app under test in the app capabilities entry when creating a new session. Similar with modern (UWP) app, you can specify launching arguments through appArguments capability. But unlike modern apps, you can also specify the app working directory for a classic app through "appWorkingDir" capability. Below is an example of creating a test session for the Notepad app that opens MyTestFile.txt in C:\MyTestFolder\.

// Launch Notepad
DesiredCapabilities appCapabilities = new DesiredCapabilities();
appCapabilities.SetCapability("app", @"C:\Windows\System32\notepad.exe");
appCapabilities.SetCapability("appArguments", @"MyTestFile.txt");
appCapabilities.SetCapability("appWorkingDir", @"C:\MyTestFolder\");
NotepadSession = new WindowsDriver<WindowsElement>(new Uri("http://127.0.0.1:4723"), appCapabilities);

// Use the session to control the app
NotepadSession.FindElementByClassName("Edit").SendKeys("This is some text");

Inspecting UI Elements

The latest Microsoft Visual Studio version by default includes the Windows SDK with a great tool to inspect the application you are testing. This tool allows you to see every UI element/node that you can query using Windows Application Driver. This inspect.exe tool can be found under the Windows SDK folder which is typically C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\bin\x86

More detailed documentation on Inspect is available on MSDN https://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/desktop/dd318521(v=vs.85).aspx.

Supported Locators to Find UI Elements

Windows Application Driver supports various locators to find UI element in the application session. The table below shows all supported locator strategies with their corresponding UI element attributes shown in inspect.exe.

Client API Locator Strategy Matched Attribute in inspect.exe Example
FindElementByAccessibilityId accessibility id AutomationId AppNameTitle
FindElementByClassName class name ClassName TextBlock
FindElementById id RuntimeId (decimal) 42.333896.3.1
FindElementByName name Name Calculator
FindElementByTagName tag name LocalizedControlType (upper camel case) Text
FindElementByXPath xpath Any //Button[0]

Supported Capabilities

Below are the capabilities that can be used to create Windows Application Driver session.

Capabilities Descriptions Example
app Application identifier or executable full path Microsoft.MicrosoftEdge_8wekyb3d8bbwe!MicrosoftEdge
appArguments Application launch arguments https://github.com/Microsoft/WinAppDriver
appTopLevelWindow Existing application top level window to attach to 0xB822E2
appWorkingDir Application working directory (Classic apps only) C:\Temp
platformName Target platform name Windows
platformVersion Target platform version 1.0
Clone this wiki locally