How to use extra arguments passed with Variable file - Robot framework

Question

In Robot Framework user guide there is a section that describes how to pass variable files and also some possible variables if needed.
Example:
pybot --variablefile taking_arguments.py:arg1:arg2

My question is can i use these possible variables arg1 and arg2 in the taking_arguments.py file afterwards and if i can then how?

Right now i have this:

pybot --variablefile taking_arguments.py:arg1:arg2

taking_arguments.py contents:

IP_PREFIX = arg1

But that results in

NameError: name 'arg1' is not defined

Bryan Oakley · Accepted Answer · 2016-07-30 15:12:36Z

6

The only way to use variables in an argument file using the --variablefile filename.py:arg1:arg2 syntax is to have your variable file implement the function get_variables. This function will be passed the arguments you specify on the command line, and must return a dictionary of variable names and values.

For example, consider the following variable file, named "variables.py":

def get_variables(arg1, arg2):
    variables = {"argument 1": arg1,
                 "argument 2": arg2,
                }
    return variables

This file creates two robot variables, named ${argument 1} and ${argument 2}. The values for these variables will be the values of the arguments that were passed in. You might use this variable file like this:

pybot --variablefile variables.py:one:two ...

In this case, the strings "one" and "two" will be passed to get_variables as the two arguments. These will then be associated with the two variables, resulting in ${argument 1} being set to one and ${argument 2} being set to two.

edited Jul 30, 2016 at 15:12

answered May 15, 2013 at 16:56

Bryan Oakley

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3 Comments

Freddy Over a year ago

Received TypeError: get_variables() takes exactly 2 arguments (0 given) when I tried the example above. This is my setup: one robot file with open browser and these two arguments ${argument 1} and ${argument 2} I am also calling the .py file in the Settings my command line execution looks like this pybot -v variables.py:username:password file.robot I am trying to pass a username and password to a form via the command line using this method, but no luck.

sjudǝʊ Over a year ago

@Freddy You've probably used wrong argument. You should use lowercase -v to define single variable. For variable file, use uppercase -V or --variablefile

Freddy Over a year ago

@sjudǝʊ Thank you for this clarification. In fact, I was passing the wrong flag. Using -V worked as expected. I still received the following error

Error in file '.../_robot/file.robot': Processing variable file '.../_robot/variables.py' failed: TypeError: get_variables() takes exactly 2 arguments (0 given)

in the logs, however, the process worked. Not sure if the error from the logs is just something that RF has trouble processing.

sdmythos_gr · Accepted Answer · 2013-05-15 11:18:37Z

2

I haven't tried to pass initial values to variables in a variable file... So I am not sure if this is something possible...

I can offer an alternative...

You can define manually some variables with their values at the pybot command...

pybot -variablefile taking_arguments.py -v IP_PREFIX:arg1 -v Varibale:Value

If I am not mistaken these manually initiated variables have a higher priority than these in the variable file. So even if they are initiated in the variable file, the values passed with the -v option will be used in the testcase.

Hope this can help you!

answered May 15, 2013 at 11:18

sdmythos_gr

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