Ghost Inspector. Automatic test in 0 minutes

“Let’s deploy, we’ll think about that on Monday”, is the <a href="https://twitter.com/agilegigi" target="_blank">Aggile Giggi</a>‘s catchphrase, the italian funny parody of a rough developer on twitter.

<span style="font-weight: 400">Actually,</span> we all risk to be Agile Giggi when we release in production if we don’t have tools and processes to make the deployment as safe as possible.

Let’s talk about testing. The risks associated with deployment can’t be reset but they can be reduced as much as possible by introducing automated tests into the workflow.

Easy to say, <span style="font-weight: 400">not so much to do it</span>. What we want to suggest today is a starting point, a tool that allows you to have a good regression tests coverage in zero time and without excessive effort.

Ghost inspector

<a href="https://ghostinspector.com/" target="_blank">Ghost inspector</a> is a good and low cost solution. With the free plan, you can run a hundred tests a month, not enough for regular use, but it’s a solid starting point.

From the Dashboard, we create a new Suite. Then we can run the various tests individually or one after the other.

Creating scenarios is very simple with a convenient <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ghost-inspector-automated/aicdiabnghjnejfempeinmnphllefehc" target="_blank">Chrome extension</a> that records user actions.

We can found our registered actions and statements in the Ghost inspector’s GUI, here they can be easily edited.

Tests can also be exported and imported into <a href="http://www.seleniumhq.org/" target="_blank">Selenium</a>.

For each Suite we can define variables to use within the tests, or get them from elements in the DOM or<span style="font-weight: 400">, moreover,</span> run our own Javascript.

<span style="font-weight: 400">After the tests, Ghost inspector provides details of the errors found in the console, a video of the running test, details of any failed tests, and also, in the case of regression, a screenshot comparison.</span>

Without writing a line of code!

Tests can be run via API and embedded with lots of <a href="https://ghostinspector.com/docs/integration/" target="_blank">build and deploy tools</a> in order to include testing in automated streams.

This platform is so much powerful, just take a look at the <a href="https://ghostinspector.com/docs/" target="_blank">documentation</a> to immediately realize the potential it has.

Testing is a broad and complex topic that we cannot exhaust just by suggesting a tool, but surely with Ghost Inspector when “we’ll think about that on Monday” we can spend a weekend a little <span style="font-weight: 400">more peaceful</span>  🙂