Modern software testing requires solutions that are faster and smarter. A test automation framework is a set of best practices, assumptions, common tools, and libraries that help quality-assurance testers assess the functionality, security, usability, and accessibility of multiple web and mobile applications. This type of framework help makes your test automation code reusable, maintainable, and stable. At their heart, they let you carry out tests automatically and produce test results without human intervention. Apply automation to tasks that are repetitive.
Modern software development relies heavily on automation, from analyzing source code looking for errors to testing to the build, packaging and deploy process. That’s the scenario where a test automation tool becomes useful.
It’s very important to select the best set of test automation tools for your specific needs and requirements. There’s lots of tools available which makes selection somewhat problematic.
You don’t need to spend money on test automation software as there is a great range of free and open source tools, libraries, and testing frameworks available.
To start your automation journey, we make the following recommendations captured in a LinuxLinks-styled ratings chart. All of the programs are free and open source goodness
Let’s explore the 14 test automation tools at hand. For each title we have compiled its own portal page, a full description with an in-depth analysis of its features, together with links to relevant resources.
| Test Automation Tools | |
|---|---|
| Selenium | Portable framework for testing web applications |
| Appium | Open source automation tool |
| Robot Framework | Python-based, extensible keyword-driven automation framework |
| Cucumber | Tool for running automated tests written in plain language |
| Cypress | Fast, easy and reliable testing |
| Gauge | Lightweight cross-platform test automation tool which uses Markdown |
| Dojo Toolkit | JavaScript toolkit that scales with your development process |
| Watir | Web application testing in Ruby |
| tox | Automate and standardize testing in Python |
| Serenity | Test automation reporting library (previously known as Thucydides) |
| Testsigma | Extensible test automation platform that works out of the box |
| Carina | Java-based test automation framework that unites all testing layers |
| nox | Automates testing in multiple Python environments, similar to tox |
| Galen | Tool for testing layout and responsive design of web applications |
 Read our complete collection of recommended free and open source software. Our curated compilation covers all categories of software. The software collection forms part of our series of informative articles for Linux enthusiasts. There are hundreds of in-depth reviews, open source alternatives to proprietary software from large corporations like Google, Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, IBM, Cisco, Oracle, and Autodesk. There are also fun things to try, hardware, free programming books and tutorials, and much more. |