While exploring Appium with mobile devices I hit the following error WebDriverException: Message: u’A new session could not be created. (Original error: atpwta.live/.activity.Main never started. Current: atpwta.live/.activity.root.TournamentList)’ Initially, I had set desired capabilities to: desired_caps[’platformName’] = ‘Android’ desired_caps[’platformVersion’] = ‘4.4’ desired_caps[’deviceName’] = ‘Moto E’ desired_caps[’appPackage’] = ‘atpwta.live’ desired_caps[’appActivity’] = ‘.activity.Main’desired_caps[‘platformName’] = ‘Android’ desired_caps[‘platformVersion’] = ‘4.4’ desired_caps[‘deviceName’] = ‘Moto E’ desired_caps[‘appPackage’] […]
appWaitActivity: A new session could not be created
Ways to identify UI elements in mobile apps
Problem: Many testers do not know how to identify UI elements in mobile apps. In this post, I explain about different ways to find UI elements in Android’s calculator app. I also show you examples of using Appium’s API with the different locator strategies. Why this post? Identifying UI elements is a key component of writing UI automation. Most testers […]
Jasmine-Jquery error: object doesn’t support this property or method
I hit an error while using Jasmine and Jasmine-Jquery on a Windows 7 machine. Turned out that the root cause of the issue was with a Chrome setting on Windows 7. I spent significant amount of time googling before I found the solution. What tripped me in my Google search was that I kept searching for Jasmine/Jasmine-JQuery errors. This mini-post […]
Where can I find applications to practice software testing?
Problem: Testers rarely test products outside of their workplace. Limiting your testing to only the applications available at your workplace slows down the rate at which your skills grow. Why this post? Too many testers leave career and skill development in the hands of their employer. Often times, employers are unable to provide the learning opportunity that the tester wants. […]
Understanding Python decorators
Problem: Some testers shy away from unit testing because they are uncomfortable with the concept of annotations. Why this post? We often stop learning a topic when we need to apply a concept that we are not fully comfortable with. I noticed this pattern in testers when it came to unit testing. A lot of unit testing frameworks, like JUnit and […]
How to rearm Windows trial license
This post is meant for testers who use modern.ie to run cross browser tests. If you are a tester and do not know about modern.ie, I recommend reading our post on cross browser testing tools. Modern.ie was created by Microsoft and allows you to use Windows virtual machines without purchasing Windows licenses. Its awesome! The downside is that the modern.ie […]
Batman and Page Objects
Problem: The page object pattern is not yet understood by the average tester. To get the most out of this post, please read this post and then read at least one of the articles listed in the Holy further reading, Batman! section below. Why this post? There are many ways to write and maintain GUI automation tests. The most common […]
Using Firebug 2.0 to craft XPaths
Firebug has been my favorite Firefox add-on for a long time now. In the time before every browser had decent developer tools, Firebug was a revolutionary add-on that allowed many testers, like myself, tools to interact, learn and explore what web applications were doing. I recently upgraded my Firebug to version 2.0. I was pleasantly surprised to find a cool […]
Get started with mobile automation: Selendroid & Python
Problem: There is a perception among testers that getting started with mobile automation is hard. Why this post? I strongly believe that a tester must have a wide range of skills. You do not need to be an expert in all of them, but it is extremely important to have contemplated a spectrum of concepts and explored a variety of […]
The art of writing xpaths
Problem: Writing XPaths is hard and confusing when there are no unique identifiers XPath (XML Path Language) is a query language for selecting nodes from Document Object Models (DOM) like XML, HTML, etc. XPaths are frequently used with Selenium scripts to uniquely identify elements in page. This post is a descriptive tutorial on how to think about xpaths and write […]