AUTOMATION 16 - GUI 4, Selenium WebDriver Installation

Technical level: ****

One of the reasons I started you out on developer tools and TamperMonkey previously was because all these things were relatively easy to get started with.

Our next few pieces will use and explore Selenium WebDriver, which I hope you will follow along with at home - but to do that, you'll need to install a lot of extra software on your system.

Install Firefox browser

We mentioned last time that out of the box Selenium WebDriver works with the Firefox browser - so it's kind of helps if you have it installed.  If you do have it, make sure it's up to date, as I've found compatibility problems if both your browser and WebDriver aren't up to date.

Currently available from here.

Install Java Eclipse

Selenium WebDriver is driven from Java, which means we need to have a Java development environment to make it work.

Currently Eclipse Java Mars is my preferred program for this - and it can currently be found here.

Install Oracle JDK

Eclipse won't work just by itself - it requires a Java development kit installed for the supporting middleware between what you code in Eclipse and your computer.

I always use the Oracle kit from here.

Download Selenium WebDriver

Finally you need to download the WebDriver library from Selenium which is currently here.

There's a huge smorgasboard of stuff there, so it can get confusing (I've actually ended up downloading the wrong thing) - remember you're after the WebDriver for Java, which is here ...

You will need to extract onto your computer - I suggest Documents/WebDriver folder.

When you create a script in Java Eclipse you will need to import these JAR file (Java ARchives) into a library to use them - don't worry, I'll walk you through it.



Next time we'll set up our first project, and run our first manipulation with WebDriver.


Golden Rule

This and the next section, you might encounter difficulties as you go through.  I'm adding help where I've encountered problems (typically my problem is I never read the instructions fully before going ahead and doing something).

However my tried and tested method when I have difficulties is to Google any error message, and work through any message boards and advice which is out there, until I find something.  Turns out most developers do the same thing!

My point being, if you are having problems, don't give up at the first hurdle.  Here's another post showing similar instructions.

If you're seriously struggling, drop me a line on Twitter, and I'll see if I can help.  Although be prepared for ...