As you probably know I am developing a series posts called- Pragmatic Automation with WebDriver. They consist of tons of practical information how to start writing automation tests with WebDriver. Also, contain a lot of more advanced topics such as automation strategies, benchmarks and researches . In the next couple of publications, I am going to share with you some Advanced WebDriver usages in tests. Without further ado, here are the today's advanced WebDriver Automation tips and trips.

1. Drag and Drop

You can use the special Actions WebDriver's class to perform complex UI interactions. Through its method DragAndDr opToOffset , you can drag and drop. You only need to set the desired X and Y offsets.

2. Upload a File It is a straightforward task to upload a file using WebDriver. You need to locate the file element and use the IWebElement's SendKeys method to set the path to your file.

3. Handle JavaScript Pop-ups Through the ITargetLocator interface of the IWebDriver, you can locate the JavaScript alert. Then you can use the Accept and Dismiss methods of the IAlert interface.

While ago when we were working on the first version of the BELLATRIX test automation framework, I did this research and afterward we used many of the tricks in lots of the features of our solution.

4. Switch Between Browser Windows or Tabs WebDriver drives the browser within a scope of one browser window. However, we can use its SwitchTo method to change the target window or tab.

The WindowHandles property returns all open browser windows. You can pass the name of the desired tab/window to the Window method of the ITargetLocator interface (returned by the SwitchTo method) to change the current target.

5. Navigation History WebDriver's INavigation interface contains handy methods for going forward and backward. Also, you can refresh the current page.

6. Change User Agent In my previous post from the series, I showed you how to create a new custom Firefox profile. You can set its argument 'general.useragent.override' to the desired user agent string.

7. Set HTTP Proxy for Browser Similar to the user agent configuration, to set a proxy for Firefox, you only need to set a few arguments of the Firefox' profile.

8. Handle SSL Certificate Error

8.1. Handle SSL Certificate Error FirefoxDriver 8.2. Handle SSL Certificate Error ChromeDriver You can use the special SetEnvironmentVariable method to create an environment variable in Windows pointing the path to your driver's executable. This way you do not need to specify the path to it every time you initialize the driver's instances.

8.3. Handle SSL Certificate Error InternetExplorerDriver

9. Scroll Focus to Control There isn't a built-in mechanism in WebDriver to scroll focus to a control. However, you can use the JavaScript's method window.scroll. You only need to pass the Y location of the desired element.