Element Explorer Feature for Appium Automation Testing

Introduction

The Element Explorer feature is designed to simplify the process of identifying elements on Android and iOS devices, making automation testing using the Appium framework more efficient and accurate. Element Explorer allows you to interactively explore your application's user interface, inspect element properties, and generate Appium locators for seamless automation scripting.

Benefits of using Element Explorer:

• Time-Saving: Element Explorer accelerates the element identification process, reducing the time spent on manual inspection and trial-and-error.

• Accuracy: The tool provides precise element properties and generates reliable Appium locators, minimizing script failures due to element identification issues.

• Automation Readiness: With Element Explorer, your automation scripts become more robust and easier to maintain.

Element Explorer Start Session

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1. Accessing Element Explorer

Element Explore is very easy to get started, it is the same process as that of starting a manual test with one additonal step.

While starting the manual test, enable the Element Explorer toggle to start a session with element explorer as show below.

Element Explorer Start Session

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2. Identifying Elements

1. Interactive Device View: Once in Element Explorer, you'll see an interactive representation of the selected device's screen. You can click on the highlighted button to load the dump of the current screen with all its element references.
2. Inspecting Element Properties:

   • Click on an element within the device view to see the Element properties of the highlighted element such as the IDs, classes, text, and other attributes.

   • Use the displayed properties to generate Appium locators for the selected element.

   • Supported locators include id, xpath, name, class name, and more.

   • Use the displayed properties to generate Appium locators for the selected element.

   

   Element Explorer Start Session

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3. Using Identifiers in Automation Scripts

1. Incorporating Locators: Copy the generated Appium locator for an element and paste it into your Appium automation script.

2. Example (Python):

   from appium import webdriver
   
   desired_caps = {
       "platformName": "iOS",
       "deviceName": "device-name",
       "udid": "device-udid",
       "automationName": "Appium",
       "app": "path/to/app.ipa"
   }
   
   driver = webdriver.Remote('<remote_endpoint>/wd/hub', desired_caps)
   element = driver.find_element_by_id("generated-id")