The Highlight elements button is added the toolbar of the Selenium IDE.
The Highlight Elements plugin for Selenium IDE is now available on the Firefox addons site.
This plugin for Selenium-IDE highlights elements specified in the Selenese commands on the web page as the test case is executed. Once this plugin is installed, a highlight elements button will be available on the Selenium-IDE main window and Sidebar. See the screen shot for details.
This plugin is very useful in debugging selenium test cases, maintaining selenium test cases and giving demos to stakeholders too. See the post Exploratory Maintenance and Debugging of Selenium Tests.
Mini user guide for the plugin
The element specified in the command is highlighted as the command is being executed.
- Click the Highlight elements button on the Selenium IDE to turn on element highlighting.
- For best effect, reduce the execution speed using the slider.
- Click the Highlight elements button on the Selenium IDE again to turn off the element highlighting.
To use this plugin, you will need to install Selenium IDE addon of at least version 1.0.4 first.
Roadmap
- Saving / loading status of the button
- Refactoring for reducing technical debt
- Internationalisation
Known Issues
- Some types of elements cannot be highlighted.
Other Thoughts
I had wanted this simple but very useful feature in Selenium IDE for a long time. I had a lot of fun developing this plugin. Some of the interesting things this time include creating a separate reusable module to provide plugin registration and cleanup, and a new (for me), cleaner, more readable and reusable approach to overriding methods.
Get it from the Firefox addons website here. Don’t forget to let me know what you think. As usual any comments, improvements, suggestions, advise, criticism,… are always welcome.
Pingback: Exploratory Maintenance and Debugging Selenium Tests | Really Simple Thoughts of a Perpetual Learner
Excellent. I have been waiting long time for this.
Thanks
Really cool!
Really good feature. Instead of adding as a plug-in, why cant it integrated with Selenium IDE tool in the coming release?
Hi Sikander,
I am glad you like the plugin. There are two main reasons why it is a plugin.
First, It is just easier to release a plugin than to get someone to apply a patch in Selenium IDE.
Second, You have a choice if it is a plugin. If you don’t like it or is does not work for you, you can get rid of it.
Cheers,
Samit