Want to use LDTP to test your application? Or do you want to automate the actions you do often? Or are you a GNU/Linux user who want to show “magic” to your friends by recording your actions and playing them back? You can use LDTP for this. But one small issue with LDTP is that you should know the LDTP Python API to write any test suite. But with the new LDTP Editor, this makes your job really simple. A screenshot of the LDTP Editor is shown below.
This is a simple HOWTO for recording and playing back the recorded script.
Installing LDTP.
Download the lastest LDTP source code from CVS
- Compile the code using ./configure and make
- If you don’t have the access to install softwares, run the ldtpeditor file in the python folder
- If you have access to install softwares, then run “make install”
Perform actions in the gcalctool. Check out this video to see the actions i recored in my computer .
- After you’re done with the actions in the gcalctool, click the Stop button in the LDTP Editor.
- You can see that the ‘Recorded Code’ tab is updated with code as when you perform actions in gcalctool.
- Click the convert button in the LDTP Editor. You’ll see that the Generated LDTP Code and Generated LDTP XML tabs are filled with generated code.
- The Play button is not working now. I wrote the patch for that yesterday night ;-).
- Save the contents of the ‘Generated LDTP Code’ into a python file (for ex frisco.py) . Note that if the file name you specify already exists, then it OVERWRITES the filename without any warning.
Note:: After installing LDTP Editor, i when i tried to run ldtpeditor, got an error saying
hari@hari-laptop:~/ldtp/ldtp-0.9.2$ ldtpeditor (ldtpeditor:11130): libglade-WARNING **: could not find glade file '/usr/share/local/ldtp/glade/ldtpeditor.glade' Glade file not found
The ldtpeditor.glade file is present in the python folder. I got this error because i compiled the code as ./configure. If i had done it as ‘./configure –prefix=/usr’, then i wouldn’t have got this error. Anyway i copied the file manually to that folder.
hari@hari-laptop:~/ldtp/ldtp-0.9.2$ sudo mkdir -p /usr/share/local/ldtp/glade/ hari@hari-laptop:~/ldtp/ldtp-0.9.2$ sudo cp python/ldtpeditor.glade /usr/share/local/ldtp/glade/ hari@hari-laptop:~/ldtp/ldtp-0.9.2$ ldtpeditor
After that when i ran ldtpeditor, it ran without any issues.
Record using LDTP Editor
For this let us consider recording the actions performed in gcalctool.
- First make sure Assistive Technology is enabled in your desktop. If you are not sure about this, open gnome-control-center and in that open Assistive Technology Preferences. You should have Enable Assistive Technologies checked to use LDTP.
- If you are enabling Assistive Technology only now, logout and login again.
- Run ldtpeditor and gcalctool.
- Make sure both you have enabled ‘Always on Top’ or both the applications and both the window doesn’t overlap with each other.
- Click the Start button the LDTP Editor. All actions performed after this are recorded.
- When done click Stop button.
- Click 'Convert' to get the code converted in LDTP format (It does some post processing, so its required)
The actions you performed while recording will be played back again
Click save button to save generated python script, if 2nd tab is empty, then it will try to get the contents of first tab and store it in the file you specify. If file already exist, it will *OVER-WRITE* NOTE: control+c, control+v doesn't work
You can run the saved file from command line like: hari@hari-laptop:~$ python frisco.py
- Sometime the resource will go high as the application map info is collected from the application, so no need to worry. With Thunderbird, the recording really sucks
- You need to have GNOME 2.14 and above to use LDTP editor
LDTP Editor Preferences
Using the LDTP Prefereces, you can control what all actions you can control. A brief summary about the options given in the Preferences window.
Listen key events This option is not yet implemented. Checking/Unchecking this doesn’t make any difference now.
Listen mouse events This option is not yet implemented. Checking/Unchecking this doesn’t make any difference now.
Generate LDTP Code Only when if this option is enabled, Convert will generated to LDTP code in the ‘Generated LDTP Code’ tab. This is enabled by default when you run LDTP Editor.
Generate Data XML If this option is enabled, the LDTP Editor will generate data XML for the actions you perform.
Generate keyboard events code Generates code for the keyboard events you performed during the recording session.
Generate wait time code Calculates the delay one takes between each action during the recording session and generates code so that similar time delay is generated while play back.
Generate Memory / CPU statistics. The code to generate Memory and CPU statistics will be generated. You need to install pystatgrab and libstatgrab packages.
Note: The generated code had many unwanted waittillguiexist. I saw waittillguiexist (”dlg0″) in many places. If your playback is stopped because of this, remove that before running the scripts. Sometime the resource will go high as the application map info is collected from the application, so no need to worry.If you find any issues regarding LDTP Editor, report it to ldtp-dev at lists.freedesktop.org or nagappan at gmail dot com or sp2hari at gmail dot com
Known issues
Demo of LDTP Recording
Inside netbeans editor
Reference
How to create LDTP test scripts in python
Running LDTP scripts How to execute scripts
Sequencing set of LDTP scripts using ldtprunner XML file
Script input Data XML file - Useful to maintain a generic script