[ptt-users] TestMaker: "Error getting page String index out of range"

[Olivier Dony]

On Sep 27, 2007, at 10:47 PM, Lars Huttar wrote:

> What I'm trying to get to work right now is this.
> I have a TestGen4Web unit test with the following action:
>        <action type="click" refresh="true" step="2">
>            <xpath><![CDATA[*/a[@href="proof/summary-by-continent"]]] 
> ></xpath>
>            <value><![CDATA[]]></value>
>        </action>
>
> When the test runs, I get the following output in Local TestNode  
> Output:
>> Step  2: (click)
>>     Executing: click
>> Error getting page String index out of range: -5
>> Got page: Ethnologue Publishing Home [which is the old page, not  
>> the page I'm clicking on the link for]
> So somehow, this action is failing because, as it seems, the  
> [@href="..."] predicate is failing via a string index out of range.

It seems you've run into a TestMaker bug. This occurs when the  
TestMaker engine attempts to convert the "pseudo-XPath" from  
TestGen4Web into the real XPath needed by the test engine. This fails  
because you predicate contains a forward slash character '/', and  
TestMaker is splitting the expression on '/' to analyze the XPath.
So it tries to handle separately */a[@href="proof and then summary-by- 
continent"], which leads to the exception you've seen.

If any of the developers read this thread, thank you for creating a  
bug report for this.

Maybe you can work around this issue by using "positional" XPath to  
find the element in the page structure.
For example:   */FORM[2]/P[1]/A[4]

As a general rule, your life will be much more easier with TestMaker  
+ TestGen4Web (and other test tools) if you can have a unique ID  
attribute on all elements you need to use in your tests: links, form  
fields, buttons, etc.


> Initially when I generated the unit test using TestGen4Web, the  
> <xpath> was:
>            <xpath><![CDATA[*/A[@CDATA="Summary by
>        area"]]]></xpath>
> which resulted in the output
>>     Executing: click
>> oldXpath  */A[@CDATA="Summary byarea"]: newXpath "//a[string() 
>> ="Summary byarea"]"
>> Elem null
>> Error getting page null
>
> So it looked like that was failing because the CDATA containing a  
> carriage return was not working as a selector.
> That's why I changed the predicate to use [@href="..."].

You're right, and this is another annoying issue. TestMaker converts  
this pseudo-predicate "@cdata" into "@string()=", but this does not  
work well with link label, due to different whitespace issues. Maybe  
if something like contains() was used to construct the real XPath it  
would work more often.


> The "String index out of range" messages seems to be a Python error.

It is actually the Java exception message occuring within  
com.pushtotest.testmaker.XSTest.client.TestGenForWeb.normalizeXPath()  
when it tries to convert the pseudo-XPath.


> I'm wondering whether this <xpath> stuff is really XPath, or just a  
> semblance thereof. I haven't been able to find reference  
> documentation for it.
> For example @CDATA doesn't seem to be real XPath, and then there's  
> the question of whether HTML elements like A are case-sensitive.

Exactly. The "XPath" locators from TG4W are not really XPath, which  
is why TestMaker needs to do the conversion on-the-fly.
I don't know if there is any documentation about this, but maybe this  
will interest you:

   http://cake.pushtotest.com/pipermail/users/2007-September/003415.html


> I guess this is a TestGen4Web issue, but it seems to be obstructing  
> use of TM, so maybe that makes it of concern to TM.
>
> Any help is appreciated.

I hope this helps.


--
Olivier Dony,

Denali s.a., "Bridging the gap between Business and IT"
Rue de Clairvaux 8, B-1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium
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