wong@cathedral.cerc.wvu.wvnet.edu (Dennis Hiulum Wong) (11/15/90)
Are there any tools or programs exist for testing X applications "automatically" so that the user doesn't need to actually click on buttons and type in the input? In other words, user can specify a sequence of actions (mouse presses, key presses, etc.) in some way and the tool will use it to run the application. I heard that X has something called the "Input Synthesis Extension" which can do similar things. Can someone give me more detail about it? Thanks in advance for any information. -- Dennis wong@cerc.wvu.wvnet.edu
coutu@decvax.dec.com (Dan Coutu) (12/06/90)
Okay, time to spill my guts... Some of you may remember some presentations made last January at the Testing BOF session which described some ways to automate testing of X. One of those was given by myself and a related one by Alan Jamison. They both were related to the use of XTrap, a server extension that provides the capability to capture not only input events but also output requests and allows the later injection of input events into the server's input queue. Well, I've managed to clear the release of this code outside of DEC and started Beta testing of XTrap over a month ago. Beta test should be done soon. When it is done I will make a compressed tar file kit and place it on expo and other choice ftp sites. XTrap is designed to drop into place in a standard X11 directory heirarchy and build with no changes to server files other than to add knowledge of the extension to the extension initialization module. You will need to write no additional code. Note: this kit does not include a real application to actually do the testing. It only includes the XTrap extension and some demo programs that illustrate how to use XTrap, and of course a document describing the whole thing. Getting the okay to release actual testing application code is quite a bit trickier, after all it is possible that some computer company might like to make some money selling such a thing. :-) I'd personally like to see at least a simple program available publicly, but getting DEC to agree to that is a different kettle of fish. I'd like to offer to answer any and all questions but I don't really have time for that. I can answer a few things in this forum I suppose but my mailbox is just too busy right now. The released kit should be available soon and I believe that is will answer a lot of questions in far more detail than I could do off the top of my head. -- Dan Coutu coutu@decvax.dec.com Open Systems Group (ULTRIX) "'...he who will not risk, cannot win.' This is, of course, my own opinion. - John Paul Jones"