Management Center test automation framework

You can use the test automation framework to write test cases that validate the Management Center model, services, and object definitions; this test framework is not intended to validate Management Center user interface widgets, such as properties views and list views.

The test automation framework uses an XML file that describes the list of actions you want to run. To point to the XML file that contains the actions you want to run, add a URL parameter named testdata to the Management Center URL. For example: 
https://<host>:8000/lobtools?testdata=/testdata/MyCompany/test.xml
This URL runs the actions in the XML file that is stored in the following location:
WCDE_installdir\workspace\LOBTools\WebContent\testdata\MyCompany
The test automation framework manages a collection of named values that can be accessed by the actions specified in the XML file. Named values are set by the wcfAutoSetValueAction action or by passing in the value as a URL parameter named testdata.param, where param is the name of the value. For example, to set a named value named storeIdentifier to AdvancedB2BDirect, add the testdata.storeIdentifier=AdvancedB2BDirect URL parameter to launch the test.xml file with these values:
https://<host>:8000/lobtools?testdata=/testdata/MyCompany/test.xml&testdata.storeIdentifier=AdvancedB2BDirect
After you log in to the Management Center, the test automation framework loads the specified XML file and runs the actions contained in the file. For example, the following URL opens the Management Center and loads the test.xml test file from the restricted directory:
https://<host>:8000/lobtools?testdata=/testdata/MyCompany/test.xml
The automated testing continues until an error occurs or all of the actions have completed. After automated testing stops, you can use one of the following methods to find more detailed information about the execution of each test step:
  • Open the Management Center message console to view messages about the major steps of your automated testing.
  • Enable logging and tracing in the Management Center and use your trace.log file to obtain more information about the execution of each test step. The following example shows information contained in a trace.log file for the wcfAutoRunTestCaseAction test step:
    [08/10/09 13:30:08:765 EDT] 0000004c auto    I [10/08/09 13:29:45:000 EDT] localhost : wcfAutomationUtil run Automation initiated.
[08/10/09 13:30:08:765 EDT] 0000004c auto    I [10/08/09 13:29:45:500 EDT] localhost : wcfAutomationUtil executeNext Executing action wcfAutoRunTestCaseAction url=/testdata/commerce/restricted/bvt.xml

XML file structure

The test automation XML file must contain a root element named testcase. Declare actions as children of the root testcase element using the action element. Each action element must define the name of the action to run. To provide instructions for the action, declare param elements as children of the action element. Param elements use the following parameters:
1 name
The name of the parameter.
2 value
The value for the parameter.
The following code snippet shows a test case that contains two actions. The first action sets a value named storeIdentifier to AdvancedB2BDirect. The second action runs another XML file located in /testdata/commerce/catalog/restricted/test.xml.
<testcase>
	<!-- Set a store value -->
	<action name="wcfAutoSetValueAction">
		< param 1 name="valueKey" 2 value="storeIdentifier"/>
		< param name="value" value="AdvancedB2BDirect"/>
	</action>
	 
	<!-- Run Catalog tool testcase -->
	<action name="wcfAutoRunTestCaseAction">
		< param 1 name="url" 2 value="/testdata/commerce/catalog/restricted/test.xml"/>
	</action>
</testdata>
The test automation framework supports the following actions: