Automation Testing (English)

中文版： See skill automation-testing.

Prompt: this directory's prompts/automation-testing_EN.md.

When to Use

User mentions automation testing, automation-testing
Need to execute this testing type or produce deliverables per Standard-version
Trigger examples: "Generate/design/write automation test cases for the following"

Output Format Options

Markdown by default. For Excel / CSV / JSON, add at the end of your request; see output-formats.md.

How to Use

Open the relevant file in this directory's prompts/ and copy the content below the dashed line.
Append your requirements and context (business flow, environment, constraints, acceptance criteria).
If you need non-Markdown output, append the request sentence from output-formats.md at the end.

Code Examples

1. Selenium + Page Object Model (Python)

Complete POM design pattern implementation with login, product management functionality tests.

Location: ../automation-testing/examples/selenium-pom-python/

Includes:

Complete Page Object Model architecture
Base page class (BasePage)
Login page, home page objects
15+ test cases
Pytest configuration and fixtures
Auto-screenshot functionality
HTML test reports

Quick Start:

cd examples/selenium-pom-python
pip install -r requirements.txt
pytest

Test Coverage:

Login functionality (valid/invalid credentials, locked users)
Product list display
Shopping cart operations (add/remove items)
Product sorting functionality
Parameterized tests

See: examples/selenium-pom-python/README.md

2. Playwright (TypeScript)

Coming soon - Modern web automation with Playwright framework.

3. Cypress (JavaScript)

Coming soon - Frontend-focused E2E testing with Cypress.

Best Practices

Automation Test Design Principles

Test Pyramid
- Unit tests (70%): Fast, stable, low cost
- Integration tests (20%): Test module interactions
- UI tests (10%): End-to-end business workflows
Page Object Model (POM)
- Encapsulate page elements and operations in page classes
- Test cases focus only on business logic
- Improve code reuse and maintainability
Wait Strategies
- Avoid fixed waits (time.sleep)
- Use explicit waits (WebDriverWait)
- Set reasonable implicit wait times
Test Data Management
- Use configuration files for test data
- Use fixtures to provide test data
- Clean up data after tests
Test Independence
- Each test should run independently
- Don't depend on other tests' execution order
- Use setup/teardown to manage test environment

Tool Selection Guide

Tool	Use Case	Advantages
Selenium	Web UI automation	Cross-browser, multi-language support
Playwright	Modern web apps	Fast, stable, multi-browser
Cypress	Frontend developers	Easy to use, live reload, debug-friendly
Appium	Mobile apps	Cross-platform, native/hybrid apps
Robot Framework	Keyword-driven	Readable, non-technical friendly

POM Design Pattern Best Practices

# ✅ Good practice
class LoginPage(BasePage):
    # Element locators as class constants
    USERNAME_INPUT = (By.ID, "username")
    
    def login(self, username, password):
        # Method returns self for method chaining
        self.enter_username(username)
        self.enter_password(password)
        self.click_login()
        return self

# ❌ Bad practice
class LoginPage:
    def login(self, username, password):
        # Hardcoded locators
        driver.find_element(By.ID, "username").send_keys(username)
        # Assertions in page class
        assert driver.find_element(By.ID, "welcome").is_displayed()

Common Pitfalls

❌ Automating unstable or unclear requirements first → ✅ Prioritize stable, high-value workflows for automation
❌ Overusing brittle UI selectors → ✅ Prefer resilient locators and shared selector conventions
❌ Mixing test logic with environment setup everywhere → ✅ Centralize setup/teardown and reusable fixtures
❌ Ignoring flaky-test tracking → ✅ Record flaky patterns and fix root causes before scaling coverage

Troubleshooting

Detailed troubleshooting steps were moved to references/troubleshooting.md. Load it on demand to keep the main skill concise.

Reference Files

prompts/automation-testing_EN.md — Automation testing Standard-version prompt
output-formats.md — Markdown / Excel / CSV / JSON request instructions
examples/selenium-pom-python/ — Complete Selenium + POM example
quick-start.md — 5-minute quick start guide

Related skills: api-testing-en, functional-testing-en, test-case-writing-en, performance-testing-en.

Target Audience

QA engineers and developers executing this testing domain in real projects
Team leads who need structured, reproducible testing outputs
AI users who need fast, format-ready deliverables for execution and reporting

Not Recommended For

Pure production incident response without test scope/context
Decisions requiring legal/compliance sign-off without expert review
Requests lacking minimum inputs (scope, environment, expected behavior)

Critical Success Factors

Provide clear scope, environment, and acceptance criteria before generation
Validate generated outputs against real system constraints before execution
Keep artifacts traceable (requirements -> test points -> defects -> decisions)

Output Templates and Parsing Scripts

Template directory: output-templates/
- template-word.md (Word-friendly structure)
- template-excel.tsv (Excel paste-ready)
- template-xmind.md (XMind-friendly outline)
- template-json.json
- template-csv.csv
- template-markdown.md
Parser scripts directory: scripts/
- Parse (generic): parse_output_formats.py
- Parse (per-format): parse_word.py, parse_excel.py, parse_xmind.py, parse_json.py, parse_csv.py, parse_markdown.py
- Convert (generic): convert_output_formats.py
- Convert (per-format): convert_to_word.py, convert_to_excel.py, convert_to_xmind.py, convert_to_json.py, convert_to_csv.py, convert_to_markdown.py
- Batch convert: batch_convert_templates.py (outputs into artifacts/)

Examples:

python3 scripts/parse_json.py output-templates/template-json.json
python3 scripts/parse_markdown.py output-templates/template-markdown.md
python3 scripts/convert_to_json.py output-templates/template-markdown.md
python3 scripts/convert_output_formats.py output-templates/template-json.json --to csv
python3 scripts/batch_convert_templates.py --skip-same

automation-testing-en