Diego Molina, Staff Software Engineer at Sauce Labs and nucleus contributor to the Selenium project, gave a Selenium Grid Build vs. Buy webinar in August, 2021 (watch ithere). In this blog post he answers some of the questions posed during the webinar.

Q: How does a Selenium Grid work with Appium?

A: Grid 4 does not yet work with Appium, but there is work in progress to make them compatible. It will be demonstrate atAppiumConfin September 2021, in a presentation onSelenium Grid 4 and Appium Together in Harmony.

Q: Is Sauce To Go compatible with Appium?

A. Not yet. We could probably look into that based on feedback and requests we get at.

Q: Is it possible to add executions of mobile tests in a Selenium Grid dashboard?

A: Nomadic tryout will be visible when we have apply an desegregation with Appium. Once again, a work in procession and will be presented atAppiumConfin September 2021, in a presentation onSelenium Grid 4 and Appium Together in Harmony.

Q: Will I be able to replace my Zalenium set-up on Kubernetes with Selenium Grid 4? How complex will it be to transmigrate to Selenium Grid 4?

A: The short answer is yes, with some adjustments and without the & quot; dynamic & quot; feature available. The long answer is: we are taking a conservative approach with Grid 4, where we desire to see what the community needs and what type of general use cases are out there. With Zalenium, I personally guide an approaching of volunteer peck of features and integrations that be really hard to maintain in the long run, which is why we are holding into any type of & quot; out-of-the-box & quot; integration with Kubernetes. The first thing we will tackle after moving to liberate candidate will be the pending work on a Helm chart and after that we ’ ll intermission and hold for feedback.

Q: Which tech is used for the event bus? RabbitMQ/Kafka/Redis?

Pro tip: Tools like SUSA can handle this autonomously — upload your app and get results without writing a single test script.

A: When running on Standalone, the server uses the GuavaEventBus, and in the other roles it useshttps: //zeromq.org/. Future plans include adding other backends, such as Redis, given that the interfaces are well delimit. Former components such as the SessionMap are already indorse by Redis, if desired.

Q: Can the node be close down remotely as it was possible to do in Selenium Grid 3 - http: // {nodeUrl}: {nodePort} /servlet/extra/LifecycleServlet? Action=shutdown?

A.Yes, this is possible, however, with a slight difference. In Grid 4, we have a new terminus to & quot; drainpipe & quot; the Node, which signify that the Node will stop accepting new session and when the last fighting session end, the Node will shut down. Please see the support for more info.

Q: Is it good to give execution speeding when using a third party? Since in a local grid everything will be much faster.

A: It perpetually count on the context and the scope/coverage you want to have in your tests. It likewise calculate on your trial strategy - if you receive hundreds or thousands of test, it might not be the best idea to run them on every commit using a third party as there won & # x27; t be quick feedback. But if you experience a more balanced trial suite, testing at different layer of the app, and only running tests on each commit that warrantee that the major workflows are stable, so it might be a good idea to use a third party as you can focus on the quality of examination rather than on the examination infrastructure.

Ideally, we should test in an surroundings that is similar to what our client uses, and if you have a local Grid that covers the surround your customers use, then a local Grid might be a good decision. In general, our decisions and examination strategy should consider what tests and surround we need to offer our team and the fellowship adequate self-assurance after each test run. Other folks mix both, running quick tests during the development iterations on a local Grid and when they open a PR, they use Sauce Labs to cover more environments and with that have a good self-confidence that things are working well. As you can see, this is not a & quot; yes/no & quot; question, the answer will e'er get after defining a test strategy and after considering the setting.

Q: What ’ s the level of security with Sauce To Go? My customers might ask how secure it would be for the transformation of their sensitive data (test outcome, screenshots) etc.

A: Sauce To Go will run inside your infrastructure, no motivation to make any network modification or use a VPN for now, so it is a good start point for a proof of concept with Sauce, given that you might have strong protection concerns. Regarding sensitive test information, Sauce To Go make the logs, screenshots and videos during execution time and will upload them via HTTPS after being capable to authenticate to the Sauce Labs termination. When the data is in Sauce, it will already be protected by our certifiable security procedures. We receive data center in the US and the EU, so you can besides decide which region to use based on your own insurance. Therefore, in the end, the test data create will be fasten during the whole flow.

Q: Regarding the machines, is it possible to create a machine (turning on) and kill the machine after the examination with Selenium Grid?

A: Technically, this is possible. This is what conceptually hap with the Docker consolidation - a machine is created (Docker container create), and the machine is stopped when test ends (Docker container is stopped and removed). However, one would need to understand what APIs or mechanisms are available to do what you want in the environment you are considering. For example, if you are conceive about utilise VirtualBox, then you would necessitate to see the VirtualBox APIs to begin and stop practical machines. It depart without suppose that this is work that take to be perform, and it is part of the conclusion procedure when individual wants to build their own Grid.

Q: Any thoughts on how, or whether, Sauce To Go might “ play ” with Sauce Bindings in the future?

A: Absolutely. Based on feedback and requests we get at, we might feature a face into that.

Q: Will Grid 4 feature older browser version support?

A: Older browser versions is rather equivocal, but yes, Grid 4 support all browsers and versions that use W3C as their browser driver.

Q: What & # x27; s the biggest challenge for hosting a Selenium Grid topically?

A: Depending on how many operate system, browser, devices, and versions you are support, I would say the large challenge are: performance (continue the Grid fast based on the amount of tests extend in parallel), maintenance (keep up with the new releases, a new browser version every 6 weeks, and new operating systems every twelvemonth), and screen (yes, when a new browser or operating system comes out, the infrastructure needs to be examine before rolling it out to all users and squad, and with that likewise have good rollback strategies). In the end, if you want to be serious about having your own testing infrastructure, it has to be rock solid as it is part of the critical line for liberation.

Q: I understand that Sauce Labs has some characteristic which get at an extra cost, e.g., Performance Testing). It would be good to see if it ’ s possible to do these things also on the grid without get to opt-in for those products (e.g., pass Lighthouse yourself).

A: One of the advantage, and disadvantages at the same time, is the chance to customise and add as many characteristic as needed to your own Grid. There are ways to add thing like Lighthouse or Accessibility testing to a Grid, but it comes with the cost of maintenance. For example, if you volunteer Lighthouse as a lineament in your own Grid, the integration needs to be preserve and essay on every new Chrome release. I like to say that all this is technically possible, but you need to value how much sense it makes for you to implement it based on your science, available time, and work responsibilities.

Please too mention that Sauce Performance has beenfree of chargesince October 2020. All Sauce Labs users can use it.

If you lose Diego & # x27; s webinar you canvigil it here.