Webdriver and other tools
Here’s a good into to some testing tools for nextgen web apps using ajax, javascript, etc.
The web testing puzzle is a jigsaw with 3 pieces, and for a long time the 3rd piece has been hiding down the side of the sofa, but I think Simon Stewart just found it. He’s called it WebDriver - it needs dusting off, but it’s looking like it’s going to be the right fit.
The problem with testing websites is that it has always been messy. It’s bound to be hard coordinating 3 tasks (browser, server, set of tests) across at least 2 processes on different hardware setups, and maybe even different platform architectures.
The set-of-tests piece of the puzzle is well understood; JUnit, TestNG, blah blah.
The well behaved server piece is solved for Java by Jetty - you can fire up an embedded server as easy as
new Server();(example).Now we can make browsers be as well behaved - we can remote control web browsers from within a Java program. WebDriver currently supports Internet Explorer, Firefox and HtmlUnit for totally embedded work.