Introducing TestCafe Testing Framework

We are happy to announce that DevExpress has released the core library of TestCafe – our automated in-browser testing tool – as an open-source framework for node.js. Now everyone in the open-source community can benefit from the technologies we developed for the commercial version.

The Problem

If you are a front-end web developer who uses node.js tools then you know how difficult it is to set up automated in-browser testing for your web app.

To begin with, even installing a testing framework can be challenging. Most existing frameworks require Selenium, which brings JDK and browser plugins with it.

Will It Work comic by xkcd
(Credit to xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1742/)

Before you can launch your first test, you also need to set up a test harness, which means dealing with configuration files. Then you’ll discover that some parts of the harness – such as reporting – might be missing and you need to install them separately. The likelihood to get functional testing in your web app will go down.

The Solution

The TestCafe framework simply allows you to skip the hassles mentioned above:

  • Pure node.js - TestCafe doesn’t use Selenium and doesn’t need plugins to run tests in real browsers. It’s built on top of node.js so it integrates and works great with modern development tools
  • No additional setup or configuration - TestCafe is all set to run tests right after npm install
  • Complete test harness - With a single launch command, TestCafe starts the browsers, runs tests, gathers the results and generates the reports

Learn more about TestCafe – take a look at the Why TestCafe? and the getting started article. If you want to hack with us, visit our GitHub page.

Try TestCafe now and tell us what you think on StackOverflow. We review and answer questions with the TestCafe tag.