Automate test of a built application

[Ulf]

Does anyone have any recommendation of a tool that makes gui testing easier and automatic for LabVIEW? I have heard that some use AutoIT, is it any good?

[hooovahh]

MonkeyLives=True?

But seriously I've never used AutoIt to test an application, just to automate button and key presses.

[Ulf]

MonkeyLives=True?

But seriously I've never used AutoIt to test an application, just to automate button and key presses.

Thats why I asked, I have never used AutoIT, so I don't know. Have you used it together with LabVIEW or other languages?

Edited October 27, 2012 by Ulf

[Minh Pham]

We have used AutoIT to test LabVIEW app. Personally I think it is very good

Scripting is easy to learn, you can definately can create an automated test routine within the 1st hour playing with the tool for sure.

Have fun

[hooovahh]

Thats why I asked, I have never used AutoIT, so I don't know. Have you used it together with LabVIEW or other languages?

I have used AutoIt with LabVIEW. If you choose to install AutoIt (which is optional) it will install some ActiveX components. I can't remember why, but when I did this I found the features to be lacking when compared to just writing AutoIt code and compiling. I also looked into getting DDE to work between an AutoIt EXE program I wrote, and LabVIEW. I could get LabVIEW to talk to the AutoIt EXE but couldn't figure out the other way for some reason.

In either case I highly recommend downloading it and at least looking at the shipped examples. They do a pretty decent job of showing you how to do the basics. There's a relatively large community out there to support more complicated programs and functions. It's very liberating, being able to download a single zip that contains source, and a method to build an EXE that will run on any Windows machine, without needing a development environment, or run-time engine.

[crelf]

I concur - I've used it a few times, mostly for iterating over multiple UUT simulations (eg: I have 1,000 images that are of UUTs, and a custom vision alogrithm that makes some measurements on them. I write an autoIT script that acts like an operator: enter a serial number that identifies the UUT image, maybe populates some other test specs, hits "GO!", waits until the status indicator turns green or red (and maybe branch here for some additional stuff it the UUT fails, switch to Excel, add a tab, fill some stuff out, switch back to my app, then rinse and repeat. I can make a minor mod to the algorithm, run the script, and let it hum away in a virtual machine while I work on other things.

The scripting language is very capable, and I agree that it's simple to learn. You can even distribute a "script" as a stand-alone exe (I've done this for customers that want to do their own testing).

[MikaelH]

Ulf,

The GDS is tested with AutoIT, it takes about 24 hours to test through 6 versions of LabVIEW, and I'm glad I don't have to do it manually.

I've even cerated a AutoIT application called StartUp.exe, which I configured as the windows shell.

This small application made sure my LabVIEW application always was running and if not, it started it.

I also have this application to silenly install LV2012 RT eninge if needed.

You can almost do anything with AutoIT, It's a great tool.

Cheers,

Mike

[hooovahh]

I also have this application to silenly install LV2012 RT eninge if needed.

This is a great idea, and I've thought of it before but never did anything about it. One issue with LabVIEW when no runtime engine is installed, is there is no way to do any thing (kinda obvious but still frustrating). Having an AutoIt EXE that just checks for the existence of the LabVIEW runtime engine seems like a great idea. Not sure what JKI does at the moment, but I assume they could use something similar when distributing VIPM to a machine that may or may not have the right runtime engine installed.

Out of curiosity how do you do the automated install of the runtime engine? I understand there is silent switches that can be used, but do you have it automatically download the runtime engine? Or do you include it with the AutoIt EXE?

[MikaelH]

Out of curiosity how do you do the automated install of the runtime engine? I understand there is silent switches that can be used, but do you have it automatically download the runtime engine? Or do you include it with the AutoIt EXE?

The Auto IT script supports attachment of files, it auto zips it and can extract them for your very quickly.

The RT engine is at about 200M, and I think it got down to 150M for everything in the AutoIT-exe file.

//Mike