M-eux Test

Visual Studio (VS) has been extended by M-eux Test with the necessary functionality to create test scripts against mobile applications running on Windows Phone, iOS, Android, BlackBerry and Windows Mobile/Windows CE by recognizing the user interface objects on the mobile device.

M-eux test can access the attributes of the user interface elements as they are defined in the mobile operating system. This is an essential technique that has been used by test automation tools on the PC for many years. M-eux Test brings this functionality to the mobile world.

In the enclosed figure you can see the new contact window on a Windows Phone device. The product can access the definition of all UI elements and thus indicate if a name is filled in, which hint text is used and which info groups are collapsed or expanded, etc. Using M-eux Test you can access and test this window independent from the state, i.e. expanded/collapsed information groups.

It is the only technique to deal with the high dynamic interfaces of the mobile applications. Windows Phone apps are not classic windows applications. They interact with the user using swipes, gestures, expanded spinner elements, highly interactive lists and many other techniques.

M-eux Test installs as an add-in for Visual Studio. The scripts can be created by recording or programming or a mix of both. The user interface objects are stored as C# classes. The intelli-sense of Visual Studio can be used to create the script.

With the M-eux Test add-in loaded, Visual Studio can recognize the user interface elements on the actual device or in the emulator.

All user interface objects are directly recognized by their attributes. This ensures:

Recording from the actual device or emulator
Replay on the actual device or emulator
Recognition of standard GUI elements on the display of the mobile device.
Recognition of html UI elements in the mobile browser.
GUI learn functionality
Automatic GUI class mapping functionality for customized objects.
Creation of an Object Pool that can be shared between test programs.
Parallel execution of test scripts on one PC.

Verification of UI elements using the values of the attributes so that bitmap verifications are used as less as possible leading to highly re-usable scripts.Using the attributes, the tool can manipulate and verify all characteristics of the mobile user interface object. No bitmap scraping or pattern matching or OCR techniques are applied ensuring high reliability and re-use of the test scripts.

The tool has proven its value in testing mobile applications handling dynamic data or mobile applications that are localized.

M-eux Test integrates with the unit testing framework of Visual Studio, allowig you to manage the coded UI tests on mobile platforms such as Android, iOS, Windows Phone and BlackBerry just like you do for Windows applications.

Through this integration, M-eux Test also supports the load and performance testing features of Visual Studio, and allows you to test the performance of your mobile application just like you test do for Windows applications.

Frederik Carlier (Jamo)