Web app test framework Selenium 2.0 now available

Selenium 2.0, the web testing framework, has been released. The last stable release of Selenium, 1.0.3, was in February 2010. Selenium is made up of an IDE for recording interaction with web applications, a remote control server which runs the tests in multiple browsers and a grid system for distributing tests across multiple servers.

The new version of Selenium is based around WebDriver. WebDriver is custom built for each browser and replaces the JavaScript application that was previously loaded alongside web applications under test. The WebDriver add-on or extension then offers a more manageable and capable remote control API for testing purposes; for example, it allows for complex UI testing which includes native keyboard and mouse events, popups and dialogs. WebDriver is supported on Firefox 5, IE 9, and is now "baked into" Opera and Chrome. Android and iPhone support has also appeared recently. The WebDriver APIs can be accessed from Python, Ruby, Java and C#, allowing developers to create tests in whichever language they feel most comfortable with.

The release also includes support in the Selenium server for distributed testing using Selenium Grid; this supports testing using the original Selenium API and WebDriver. The developers are adding support for the new features to Selenium's IDE and expect to release version 1.1.0 of the IDE – which will export code in all four of the supported languages – next week. The developers feel they have reached a point with Selenium 2.0 where they expect the APIs to only change a little in the future and they will initially concentrate on fixing any "niggles and bugs" in the "solid release".

Selenium 2.0 is a drop-in replacement for Selenium 1.x users, who will find many bug fixes and stability improvements too. The new release is available to download and all Selenium projects are licensed under the Apache 2.0 Licence.

(djwm)