With advancing technology, end users started to appreciate the use of portability. So, various portable mobile devices like smartphones, tablets, and smartwatches started to arrive on the market. The major advantage of these devices is that they can provide desktop-like performance while fitting in the pockets of the end users. Therefore, the smartphone industry rose as one of the most thriving segments of the app development sector. However, mobile app testing is a very complex process as the mobile market is one of the most diverse segments. Advanced testing processes like real device testing and various cloud solutions like LambdaTest can heavily benefit this process.
So, with this article, we are going to understand how app developers can perform cross-platform mobile testing with LambdaTest while using Appium test cases. We will also understand the role of real device testing to improve the accuracy of the final Test reports.
The Basics of Cross-Platform Mobile Testing
In the mobile segment, the three most popular platforms include Android, iOS, and Windows. So, to maintain optimal end-user coverage, the application developers must provide compatibility on all of these platforms. However, contemporary practice involves the individual creation of native applications for all of these platforms. However, it was a time-consuming process and also drained a lot of company resources. In the modern generation, cross-platform apps can help the developer solve this issue. Cross-platform applications share a common database that can be accessed on multiple platforms.
Since cross-platform applications use a lot of dynamic elements, the application testing process becomes one of the most critical factors. Various modern cloud-based solutions like LambdaTest massively help developers to initiate and execute automated cross-platform test cases. The benefit of automation test increase is that it can automatically emulate human interactions based on various data sets without requiring any form of manual intervention.
Introducing Appium
Appium is an open-source tool that allows application developers to verify the proper functioning of user interface elements present in a web-based mobile application. However, while using Appium, the application developers can also verify the performance of other mobile apps like native apps and hybrid apps. It uses JSON wire protocol that is highly similar to the existing Selenium JSON protocol used by the web driver interface. While using Appium, the app developers can initiate automated mobile test cases on all the popular platforms like iOS, Android, and Windows. Appium also supports the integration of parallel testing further to boost the efficiency of the automation test cases.
An Introduction to LambdaTest and Real Device Testing
Real device testing is highly efficient for accurately pinpointing the physical behavior of an application based on the device. Some of the most important physical parameters include low battery, unstable bandwidth, or user interaction errors. However, the process to set up and maintain a real device test lab is highly expensive and hectic to update. Instead, the application developers can integrate platforms like LambdaTest that provide access to real device clouds. These clouds have multiple real devices stored on remote servers that can be accessed through the Internet. Some of the other benefits of LambdaTest include access to legacy devices, real-time activity logs, and removal of Geo Location Barriers.
LambdaTest is an automated cloud-based digital experience testing platform for modern web apps. LambdaTest supports the execution of automation test scripts from Playwright, Cypress, and Windows. The automation test cases from Selenium can be executed on more than 3000+ simultaneous browser instances with this platform. Finally, the integration of hundreds of real devices with thousands of simulation software boosts the dependability of the test reports.
Before proceeding towards cross-platform mobile testing, let us understand how LambdaTest benefits the process of real device testing:
- With LambdaTest, it is possible to access real iOS and Android devices that are present on the cloud. Currently, LambdaTest has a store of thousands of such devices that can be easily accessed through its cloud servers.
- It is also possible to test the functioning of web applications for browser compatibility across multiple browsers while using the same session. It achieves this goal with the integration of parallel test execution.
- While using the LambdaTest cloud, the app developers can run high volumes of test cases using their favorite automation frameworks which include XCUITest and Appium.
- The LambdaTest cloud for real device testing also supports the debugging of real-world scenarios. Some of the common issues supported by it involve device activity logs, app logs, network logs from videos, and screenshots. It also helps to identify some other user interface elements and debug using the Appium inspector and DevTools.
Cross Platform Mobile testing on Appium with LambdaTest
Before initiating cross-platform mobile testing on Appium with LambdaTest, the application developers have to be aware of some of the prerequisites. After this, there are a few simple steps that need to be followed. So, for the simplicity of the new application developers and testers, we have listed all of the steps below:
- The first step in this process is to set up the Appium environment using the preferred programming language. Some of the languages that are supported by both Appium and LambdaTest include JavaScript, Python, Java, and many others. For the simplicity of the new application developers and testers, we have written a few sample test codes for cross-platform mobile testing on JavaScript:
const { remote } = require(‘webdriverio’);
const desiredCapabilities = {
platformName: ‘Android’, // Change to ‘iOS’ for iOS testing
platformVersion: ‘11.0’, // Change to your desired Android/iOS version
deviceName: ‘Google Pixel 3’, // Change to your desired device
app: ‘path/to/your/app.apk’, // Path to your Android .apk or iOS .app file
// Add any other desired capabilities
};
(async () => {
const driver = await remote({
hostname: ‘localhost’,
port: 4723,
path: ‘/wd/hub’,
capabilities: desiredCapabilities
});
try {
// Your test steps here
const element = await driver.$(‘#com.example.app:id/button’);
await element.click();
} finally {
await driver.deleteSession();
}
})();
- The next step is to ensure that all the necessary dependencies, which include the Appium server client, mobile device drivers, and programming languages SDKs are installed on the native machine of the application testers. In this phase, we would highly advise the app developers to download all of these files from the official website to avoid any form of privacy issues.
- Now, it is time to create a LambdaTest account in case the application developers do not have one. For this step, they have to navigate to the official website of LambdaTest and sign up for an account. It is also important to purchase a relevant LambdaTest license that will provide the access key in the LambdaTest dashboard.
- After setting up the LambdaTest, the application developers have completed the prerequisites for cross-platform mobile testing. Now they have to upload their mobile application to LambdaTest. It is also important to upload the Appium test scripts to LambdaTest. Based on the parameters set in the test, LambdaTest will initiate the test cases for verifying the performance of the application. The developers have to enter the following code to set up LambdaTest account with Appium:
from appium import webdriver
# LambdaTest credentials
LT_USERNAME = ‘YOUR_LAMBDATEST_USERNAME’
LT_ACCESS_KEY = ‘YOUR_LAMBDATEST_ACCESS_KEY’
desired_caps = {
‘platformName’: ‘Android’,
‘platformVersion’: ‘11.0’, # Change to your desired Android version
‘deviceName’: ‘Google Pixel 3’, # Change to your desired device
‘app’: ‘YOUR_LAMBDATEST_APP_URL’, # Replace with the URL of your uploaded app on LambdaTest
‘name’: ‘Appium Python Test on LambdaTest’,
‘build’: ‘Appium Python Build’,
}
# LambdaTest endpoint for Android
LT_URL = f’https://{LT_USERNAME}:{LT_ACCESS_KEY}@hub.lambdatest.com/wd/hub’
# Initialize the Appium driver
driver = webdriver.Remote(LT_URL, desired_caps)
try:
# Your test steps here
# For example, you can find an element and perform a simple action:
element = driver.find_element_by_xpath(‘//android.widget.TextView[@text=”Hello World!”]’)
element.click()
# Perform additional test actions as needed
finally:
driver.quit()
- Since the parameters play a critical role in the test case execution process, we would advise the app developers to configure the desired capabilities before beginning the testing process. Some of the important parameters include device selection, operating system selection, and certain software specifications. It is also important to set these capabilities in Appium test scripts before compiling them.
- Finally, when the app developers have configured all the automation test scripts, they can trigger them using the LambdaTest API or the web interface. The system will automatically execute the test cases depending on the desired operating system and device configuration, as the app developers have mentioned. The test execution will take place on the LambdaTest real device and browser cloud.
- After the system has completed all the test cases, it will display the final Test report. These test reports will also consist of all the bugs and errors that might be present in the core framework of the application. So, depending on this report, the app developers have to move on to the debugging process to remove these errors. LambdaTest also maintains a real-time activity log that stores all the data and screenshots to easily navigate to the application to find these errors.
A very useful tip would be to name the test cases according to their target elements. It will allow the app developers to keep track of all the elements when they are working on certain complex applications that have thousands of these elements. Finally, it is very important to rerun these test cases a couple of times to ensure that the core framework of the application is devoid of any issues. We would also advise the app developers to re-run these test cases whenever they release any update to the app to ensure the new elements do not harm the functioning of the existing ones.
It is also important for the application developers to go through the official documentation that comes with LambdaTest. This is because it will provide information regarding all the features and methods that are available with it. Appium also has official documentation showing multiple sample test cases to understand its functioning and other features.
The Conclusion
With this article, we guided the new developers through the process of executing cross-platform testing with the help of Appium on LambdaTest. To properly utilize the full potential automated testing processes, the application developers should also try to integrate various innovations and trends that are always revolutionizing automation testing practices. It is also very important to correctly choose the testing tools that will complement the requirements of not only the app project but also the developers. Finally, it is very crucial to gather adequate information regarding the requirements of the audience base for customizing the app.
