“Why do we fall?” This is a question directed at a young Bruce Wayne by the lovable butler Alfred Pennyworth in Batman Begins. The answer? “So that we can learn to pick ourselves up.” It’s a wise and heartwarming approach to failure, a quote that teaches us to learn from our mistakes.
What I see too often though is folks running multiple UI tests in an attempt to validate specific output values or logic. A much easier way to accomplish this task is to run specific API tests on the business logic of the software. Why should we do this? It’s much faster and easier to write these tests. We can have our developers supporting this process and not just Selenium or automation experts. 'Work smarter, not harder' is a theory we should all be familiar with.
Here at Sauce Labs, we love Selenium. It was created by our co-founder Jason Huggins, so it will always have a soft spot in our hearts. But the truth is, if we are being technical, Selenium is more of a robotic browser control mechanism than a true test automation framework. While Selenium can definitely be part of your test automation strategy, the use of it in itself would not qualify as a proper testing strategy.