I'm trying to figure out how to create test infrastructure that has WebdriverIO (WDIO) using an Electron app and a web browser with the user interacting with both interchangeably.
The flows would involve the Electron app opening a link within the app that directs to a browser window. The script interacts with that web page (e.g., perform some third-party auth, engage with a web page that doesn't have an app equivalent page), then switches the flow back to the Electron app. We've used some API routes for some level of coverage to mimic the browser flow, but it'd be ideal to have a full UI flow.
The app code I'm working with seems to use Electron's ipcMain functionality to achieve these flows outside of a test context. The test code uses wdio-electron-service to accomplish separate electron app and electron web flows, but not scenarios where the two need to be combined.
Avenues that I've tried looking into were:
Appium seems to support this for mobile apps via their driver.context, but their platform doesn't support Electron apps. Much of the documentation I find seems to centre around mobile/web and not electron desktop/web
Checking others' posts on WDIO's Gitter. Folks suggested looking into their multiremote functionality which seems to be more for running the same flow across different browsers, or with two user states like a chat feature. A user had the same question as me a couple years ago
https://gitter.im/webdriverio/webdriverio?at=5fa15fe8b86f6407042b2262
https://gitter.im/webdriverio/webdriverio?at=5fa17f0dc950f95c4a8d2c60
and was directed to post on here but the question is closed (https://stackoverflow.com/questions/64665715/how-to-perform-cross-browser-verification-from-one-webdriverio-session)
WDIO's documentation to switch windows, get window IDs, and the like don't recognize a browser session started by Electron as a window from trying some proofs of concept.
I'm guessing there's not an out of the box solution for this, especially with Spectron being deprecated; but was curious if others had approached this problem before?
Related
I'm planning an app for work and venturing into potential features which I've not used before.
Essentially I need to be able to access files on a network share, read, write and delete files as well as amend the file names. As a pretty closed platform I'm not sure whether iOS is capable of such a thing and if it is, what features should I look for to begin researching?
My Google-Fu hasn't come up with anything thus far so hopefully looking for someone to point me in the right direction.
Thanks.
I know this isn't very secure, but I'd personally create an ASP.NET app on your target Windows Server, or a different Server on the domain. Create web services exposed, and make an iOS app with UIWebView. You can do RPC calls from the web service that do WMI/ADSI/File System manipulation. You can prompt for domain credentials, and do remote calls essentially is the gist.
You could expose the web app so that your app can access it from local network, or URL. If you were to access it from outside I'd suggest using some secure credentials in Windows/IIS.
Some years ago I created a "mobile-friendly" web app that allowed me to manage servers, perform RPC, and do basic Active Directory queries. Also allowed file listing and deletion/moving/copying with some creative scripting. It was essentially a ASP.NET/C# web app that loaded in a iPhone app. UIWebView in iOS was a able to load it, used AJAX and some other client side scripting that looked decent. You'd essentially have to make sure that your web app renders properly in Safari/UIWebView (which is bastardized safari).
Here's a link to a demo of what I created:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czXmubijHwQ&t=12s
I ran it in a browser, but it'd run from my PSP, Android test devices, iPod Touch, Blackberry, etc.
This might be a silly question, but wondering if I was able to build an iOS app completely in a UIWebview. Essentially not have one thing be native to iOS.
You can actually. There are several ways to use HTML5, CSS3, and Javascript to make mobile apps like iOS. You can use frameworks/programs like Cordova/PhoneGap. These frameworks/programs can let you use web languages and then compile it into an executable for the device. Something that can be submitted to the AppStore. Whether or not Apple accepts it thats another story. ;)
The other thing you can do is you want it to completely run off the web is you can essentially build a web app on a server like any other web app. However, you can put in CSS3 media queries and Javascript that can detect the size of the screen. Users can use their built in web browsers to access your site. If the screen isn't the right size, then you can redirect the user like if they try to access it with a laptop. With this method you can use server side scripting languages like PHP to do your computation processing. However, connection is required to the server and if a whole lot of people log in to your server, then the server can get bog down.
If you are interested in using web base languages for mobile applications, I highly suggest looking into PhoneGap/Cordova.
I'm working on a web application that uses django.
I would like to create a native application of the site for ios / android using phone gap.
Is this possible? As I understand native devices cannot interpret python code.
It is early in the project and if it proves too difficult I may go with a different framework I.e backbone.js.
Any thoughts / experiences?
That's right, you cannot run python code on iOS or Android using PhoneGap, but there is no need to do that. Yes, you can build a native mobile application of your site using PhoneGap.
I'll try to explain a bit how these technologies compare to each other:
Django is a python web framework running on a web server
PhoneGap is a framework for building native mobile applications using web technologies (HTML5+CSS+Javascript), the application will run on a mobile device
One common approach is to build the mobile UI with i.e. jQuery Mobile and use the Django web application to provide a RESTful API to get data to the application.
Take a look at this another question for more details.
Edit: Answer the question in the first comment
Yes, it's possible to build a fast and well working application with these frameworks. The performance with today's smartphones is more dependent on the quality of the implementation than i.e. jQuery mobile and Django in themselves.
Basically with PhoneGap there are three different ways for showing the content to the user:
server side generated pages
pages generated on the client side with Javascript usin data from the server, transferred in a predefined format using for example JSON
a combination of the previous two
This answer clarifies server-client communication and page rendering quite well.
You could use PhoneGap a bit like a constrained web browser, and basically show content directly from your server as you would when the user accesses the site with a normal web browser. But I don't recommend this, though. This approach has many downsides to it (i.e. what happens when the user opens a link from your website leading to another website?)
To be accurate, at least in my opinion, UI written with Javascript and running inside an app built with PhoneGap is not native. Comparing native applications and PhoneGap applications is another thing, here is one take on explaining the differences.
I don't know what kind of service you are building, but in general I'd suggest evaluating the different approaches before starting to build an application. Would a responsive mobile optimized web site do or is there real need for what an app can provide?
If you decide to build an app with PhoneGap, I'd suggest that you do it with client side Javascript and fetch the data from the Django backend with XHR requests in JSON format. There are lots of examples available in the internet.
Since Rails uses MVC architecture. I was wondering that if we can use Rails to develop a mobile app or any web app.
Out of MVC the 'M' and 'C' won't change to develop the mobile app right?
I mean the models and controllers will remain the same.
Only the view portion should be changed such that, instead of using html.erb files I want Java or Android SDK or whatever, to provide the UI for the mobile user.
Can someone enlighten me on this perspective?
Also I have been hearing about jRuby does it come into play for our mobile app development requirement?
The answer to this question is going to depend on how you want to deploy this app. Do you want it running completely on the phone or can it be a web app disguised as an iphone/android app?
For the native app solution I'd checkout the Rhodes Framework. It's not RoR but you'll see that it's an MVC framework that feels similar. This will allow you to build native iphone/android apps using Ruby.
For the 2nd option, web app disguised as a mobile app, I'd recommend Sencha Touch. Sencha has done an amazing job mimicking the look and feel of native iphone/android apps with their Javascript library. With this solution it would be just like any other web app though it's targeted for android and iphone via it's UI.
I've created an example rails / ember.js App that is exported with Phonegap. It uses just the usual MVC architecture of a Rails and an Ember.js App. Maybe you will find it useful. It also implements token authentication based on ember-auth and several OAuth strategies.
Currently in de the devel branch: https://github.com/joscas/base_app/tree/devel
Heroku deploy: https://starter-app-staging.herokuapp.com (the desktop version)
Exported with phonegap-rails gem (of which I'm also the author) for assets, fix paths etc.
Absolutly YES!
Ruby on Rails just a backend tech, is the same as what you plan to do for normal browser. There are only two things that you need to consider about mobile app. First is mobile browser's content size because you need to adjust your layout to fit the size. There is a HTML meta tag called viewport can help you.
Ex.
This script will tell user's browser that the content should be fit the devise size,initial-scale defines the viewport rate and maximum-scale defines how many times this page can scale, and user-scalble=0 means user cannot scale the page. More about viewport you can check the Mozilla's doc.
The other thing you need to consider is the HTML5 techs, but actually these aren't problems when you are using jQuery mobile. I recommend you to check their docs. This is very useful and clear for anyone.
RubyonRails is web application framework - it is running on server and user observer the result of application built on RubyOnRails inside browser(or Browser component), despite the fact that you can process on server just "M" from "MVC", and implement "V" and "C" fully on client side( in mobile browser).
In theory, you can fully deploy RubyOnRails application on client side( even RubyOnRails server and etc), but it will be rather expensive and hard, but it is could not be require in any rational project.
assuming:
There are two way you can choose:
Organize RubyonRails application on the server(process there Model), and process "V" and "C" on client side with any proper js libraries.
You can develop Ruby(not RubyOnRails application) - at least it is possible to develop for Android with JRuby.
Yes you can . Your view can be an web page/android/ ios application as view.
You may want to try jQuery Mobile (which is still in alpha by now) if it's just a matter of UI. If you need a tighter integration with your mobile, I don't think that running Rails would be efficient enough.
Try using React Native, the backend technology can still be Ruby while the front-end can use React Native to build mobile app both Android and iOS.
React Native
I'm a bit confused about all this OAuth bruhaha in the sense that all the examples I can find are for web applications and none of them for desktop applications.
I understand the Web application work flow, but that includes some redirections between the web app and twitter.
How does one do this in an desktop application?
How does the redirects work?
Should I have to include a Web Browser object?
Is there a way to go around this?
Could anyone point me to resources instead of a full blown solution please?
Thanks
Not sure which language you're using, but the .NET library for Twitter called Tweetsharp has a post on using Tweetsharp from a desktop app and authenticating via OAuth. See http://tweetsharp.com/?p=68. If you're not using .NET then perhaps it will inspire something you can do?
Basically, what tweetsharp does is launch the browser to the authentication URL and then waits for the user to return. I don't know of any way to do this other than something like that (Or include a WebBrowser control of some kind to launch the authentication URL in your own window).
Here's a straightforward solution, implemented as a set of PHP scripts for running from the command line. Well documented and explained, with a helpful 'verbose' option for debugging.
http://nullinfo.wordpress.com/oauth-twitter/
After some poking around and asking some questions about this subject to some other programmers, it looks like it's still an ongoing discussion, with no visible light at the end of the tunnel.
But for people interested on the ongoing discussion, here's the best link to have:
OAuth Desktop Discussion
I've seen a few desktop apps get around this by effectively embedding a browser into their program, so they can just open the in-app browser window to let you do the login and authorisation. This strikes me as a bit of a cheat or defeat of purpose because you still end up typing your ID and password inside the application anyway.
One possibility I was thinking of was, your desktop application could embed a mini HTTP server inside it. So then it launches the default browser to perform the authorisation, with a callback URL something like http://127.0.0.1:8765/oauthorized and then just listen for it.
Would that work?
Not sure what you would do for console applications... spawn a copy of lynx?
Include a WebBrowser control in your app. Put it in a panel or a separate form that you'll Form.ShowDialog().
Create a callback for the browser's successful posting of OAuth and one for a rejection. Don't forget to check for a FailWhale.
In the callback, you close the panel or form and store the token.
Here's a nice overview with sample code and everything: http://tweetsharp.com/2009/04/how-to-authenticate-a-desktop-application-with-oauth/