How to reuse the same WebDriver in different application using selenium

Question

i'm writing here to ask if is possible to init WebDriver

WebDriver driver = new FirefoxDriver();

and use the same browser for many jar application, so doing, in other jar file, something like:

int port = ...;
String host = ...;
WebDriver driver = getDriver(host,port);

i ask this question because FirefoxDriver is very slow to load and happear, and i need to call many jar that load that driver. i think that in this way, loading just one time my driver, my total application will be fastly than open N-times N-instances of that driver. i hope that my question is clear and well-formed :) thanks to all!

EDIT: i see that there is the possibility to use RemoteWebDriver.

DesiredCapabilities capability = DesiredCapabilities.firefox();
WebDriver driver = new RemoteWebDriver(new URL("http://localhost:4444/wd/hub"), capability);

How can i use it? when i have to instantiate the webdriver in localhost:4444?

Using the pageobject design pattern, I believe people usually pass around the instance of WebDriver from page to page and therefore don't need to reuse the browser. For a while I was extending FirefoxDriver and overriding methods to force the re-use of a browser, which worked for a while but then it broke again around build 2.17 or so and I haven't got it to work since then. — djangofan
– djangofan, Commented Oct 4, 2012 at 20:03

Petr Janeček · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-24 14:44:21Z

1

This is the most demanded feature request in Selenium. However, it's still not possible to attach a WebDriver to running browser window. What you discovered in RemoteWebDriver is the posibility to run tests remotely on another computer. But that computer still has to start a new browser window.

You could, I guess, write your application as something as a HUB that would enqueue all jars (classes) to run, would start a single instance of Firefox and pass the driver reference around. It's not a nice solution and as far as I know, nobody has done it yet.

BUT! The majority of time spent on startup in Firefox is creating a new FirefoxProfile. If you created one profile dedicated to testing and started your Firefox always with this profile, it would be significantly faster.

answered May 24, 2012 at 14:44

Petr Janeček

38.5k13 gold badges128 silver badges149 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

2 Comments

Jayyrus Over a year ago

how can i create a firefoxprofile and attach to every webdriver?

Petr Janeček Over a year ago

Get any profile. Even a clean one. They are stored at %APPDATA%/Mozilla/Mozilla Firefox/profiles or %TEMP% (there are temp profiles from WebDriver). Store the folder anywhere. Instantiate FirefoxDriver with that Profile.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

How to reuse the same WebDriver in different application using selenium

1 Answer 1

2 Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

2 Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related