Automated Testing Of Web Apps Using Codeception

We are building websites and web applications using PHP and Yii Framework since 2012. Initially, we used manual testing techniques to confirm proper functioning of our solutions. Sometimes, we tested the same website multiple times and wasted lot of time doing repetitive testing work. Without any doubt, the experienced developers did understand the importance of testing. However, the beginners skipped the testing, therefore, producing unreliable web applications. The actual reason for not testing web applications was that developers quite often did not write the test cases for the projects. The bitter reality of the PHP world was that the unit tests were not so popular with it.

Codeception was then launched in 2011, an open-source PHP framework built on top of PHP Unit for testing web applications. It boosts the speed and simplifies functional testing for various frameworks.

It works on creating the tests which are easy to understand, write and debug. The testing code written in Codeception can be executed as a functional test in Symfony, Symfony2, Zend Framework and Yii2 framework. It can use builtin phpBrowser or Selenium to load web pages. The tests in Codeception are written in a descriptive manner which clearly shows what is being tested and how the test is being performed. It allows writing test cases for all the tests; Acceptance, Functional, Unit and even API.

Acceptance testing, also called User Acceptance testing is done on the client side to check whether website/application is working properly on the client side.

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