How To Use TestNG Reporter Log In Selenium

What is the Reporter Class in TestNG?

Reporter Class is an inbuilt class in TestNG which is available under the org.testng package. This class provides test methods to log messages that will be included in the HTML reports generated by TestNG. Reporter Class is one of the simplest ways of generating log information.

It helps in storing logs in the reports that can be either user-generated or system-generated reports. This can be hugely beneficial when we later look at the reports as it helps derive detailed information from the logs. This avoids the need to rerun the entire test case.

For example, if you have a test case with many steps, Reporter Class can prove to be extremely helpful since you can specify different logs at each step and later use them when debugging the failures.

Let’s see how we can use the TestNG Reporter Log in Selenium-based test automation framework.

How to log messages in reports using TestNG Reporter Class?

Now that we have seen the basics of TestNG Reporter Log in this Selenium TestNG tutorial, let’s deep dive into how we can use the same in our Selenium Automation Framework. We would do the same by demonstrating through a TestNG Reporter Log example.

Use Case: Automate the Simple Form Demo Page of Selenium Playground using the Cloud Selenium Grid By LamdaTest.

TestMu AI provides a cloud-based cross browser testing tool that allows users with an easy way to manage their manual and automated tests across 3000+ online browsers and operating systems combinations. Here’s how you can perform cross browser testing using TestNG.

We will cover the below steps in our test case and use Reporter Class to log all the necessary details.

• Open https://www.lambdatest.com/selenium-playground/
• Click on Simple Form Demo
• Enter a message in Single Input Field and retrieve the Message
• Enter a value in the Two Input Fields and retrieve the total of those total values
• Validate the actual and expected values.

Below attached is the test class file, its corresponding testng.xml file, and the pom.xml, which is needed in running the same.

package LamdaTest;
 
import org.openqa.selenium.By;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;
import org.openqa.selenium.remote.DesiredCapabilities;
import org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebDriver;
import org.testng.Assert;
import org.testng.Reporter;
import org.testng.annotations.AfterTest;
import org.testng.annotations.BeforeTest;
import org.testng.annotations.Listeners;
import org.testng.annotations.Test;
 
import java.net.MalformedURLException;
import java.net.URL;
 
@Listeners({util.Listener.class})
class ReporterTest {
 
 
   public String username = "YOUR USERNAME";
   public String accesskey = "YOUR ACCESSKEY";
   public static RemoteWebDriver driver = null;
   public String gridURL = "@hub.lambdatest.com/wd/hub";
 
   @BeforeTest
   public void setUp() throws Exception {
       DesiredCapabilities capabilities = new DesiredCapabilities();
       capabilities.setCapability("browserName", "chrome");
       capabilities.setCapability("version", "93.0");
       capabilities.setCapability("platform", "win10"); // If this cap isn't specified, it will just get the any available one
       capabilities.setCapability("build", "TestNGReporterLog");
       capabilities.setCapability("name", "TestNGReporterLogSample");
       try {
           driver = new RemoteWebDriver(new URL("https://" + username + ":" + accesskey + gridURL), capabilities);
       } catch (MalformedURLException e) {
           System.out.println("Invalid grid URL");
       } catch (Exception e) {
           System.out.println(e.getMessage());
       }
   }
 
 
   @Test
   public void learnSingleInputFieldUsingSelenium() {
       try {
           Reporter.log("Logging into Selenium Playground");
           driver.get("https://www.lambdatest.com/selenium-playground/");
           Reporter.log("Logged into Selenium Playground. Now, Clicking On Simple Form Demo", true);
 
           //Clicks on the simple form demo option in the selenium playground
           WebElement simpleFormDemo = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//a[text()='Simple Form Demo']"));
           simpleFormDemo.click();
           Reporter.log("Clicked successfully on Simple Form Demo option.", 2);
 
           //Enters the message in the enter message input box
           WebElement messageInputBox = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@id='user-message']"));
           messageInputBox.sendKeys("Running my first testcase using Lambda Test");
 
           //Clicks on Show Message button
           WebElement showMessageButton = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//button[text()='Show Message']"));
           showMessageButton.click();
 
           //Retrieves the entered user message
           WebElement userMessage = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//label[text()='Your Message: ']//parent::div//span"));
           String actualUserText = userMessage.getText();
           Reporter.log("Actual User Input Is: " + actualUserText, 2, true);
 
           Assert.assertTrue(actualUserText.equals("Running my first testcase using Lambda Test"), "Expected and actual texts do not match.");
       } catch (Exception e) {
 
       }
 
   }
 
   @Test
   public void learnMultipleInputFieldUsingSelenium() {
       try {
           Reporter.log("Logging into Selenium Playground");
           driver.get("https://www.lambdatest.com/selenium-playground/");
           Reporter.log("Logged into Selenium Playground. Now, Clicking On Simple Form Demo", true);
 
           WebElement simpleFormDemo = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//a[text()='Simple Form Demo']"));
           simpleFormDemo.click();
           Reporter.log("Clicked successfully on Simple Form Demo option For Multiple input fields.", 2);
 
           WebElement firstInputBox = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@id='sum1']"));
           firstInputBox.sendKeys("2");
 
           WebElement secondInputBox = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//input[@id='sum2']"));
           secondInputBox.sendKeys("2");
 
           WebElement getTotalButton = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//button[text()='Get Total']"));
           getTotalButton.click();
 
           WebElement userMessage = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//label[text()='Total a + b = ']//parent::div//span"));
           String actualUserText = userMessage.getText();
 
           Reporter.log("The total of the two entered user inputs is: " + actualUserText, 2, true);
           Assert.assertTrue(actualUserText.equals("4"), "Expected and actual texts do not match.");
       } catch (Exception e) {
 
       }
 
   }
 
   @AfterTest
   public void closeBrowser() {
       driver.close();
       Reporter.log("The driver has been closed.", false);
 
   }
 
}

You can make use of the below testng.xml to run the above java class. Here, we are running the tests in parallel with 2 threads and a verbosity level of 10. You can right-click on the testng.xml file and choose the Run as TestNG option to run the same.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE suite SYSTEM "http://testng.org/testng-1.0.dtd">
<suite thread-count="2" name="TestNGReporterTest" parallel="classes" verbose="10">
 
   <test name="TestNGReporterTest" preserve-order="true">
       <classes>
           <class name="LamdaTest.ReporterTest">
               <methods>
                   <include name="learnMultipleInputFieldUsingSelenium"/>
                   <include name="learnSingleInputFieldUsingSelenium"/>
               </methods>
           </class>
       </classes>
   </test>
</suite>

Below pom.xml will be needed for installing all the necessary dependencies.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0"
        xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
        xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/xsd/maven-4.0.0.xsd">
   <modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
 
   <groupId>org.example</groupId>
   <artifactId>LambdaTest</artifactId>
   <version>1.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
   <dependencies>
       <dependency>
           <groupId>org.seleniumhq.selenium</groupId>
           <artifactId>selenium-api</artifactId>
           <version>4.0.0-alpha-7</version>
       </dependency>
       <dependency>
           <groupId>org.testng</groupId>
           <artifactId>testng</artifactId>
           <version>6.14.3</version>
       </dependency>
       <dependency>
           <groupId>org.seleniumhq.selenium</groupId>
           <artifactId>selenium-remote-driver</artifactId>
           <version>4.0.0-alpha-7</version>
       </dependency>
   </dependencies>
 
   <properties>
       <maven.compiler.source>8</maven.compiler.source>
       <maven.compiler.target>8</maven.compiler.target>
   </properties>
 
</project>

Code Walkthrough

Now, let’s try to understand the test case using the TestNG Reporter Log, which we automated.

• Imported Dependencies: Here, we have imported all the necessary classes, including the Reporter Class needed for using Reporter.log methods.

  

• Global Variables: As we have used an online Selenium Grid like LamdaTest to perform parallel testing, we are using the below-shown variables. Here is a brief video to help you with Parallel Testing in TestNG.

  Here, you can populate the values for your corresponding username and access key, which can be collected by logging into your LamdaTest Profile Section. You can copy the Username and the Access Token to be used in the code. However, the gridURL will remain the same, as shown below.

  

  Also Read: Selenium Grid Setup Tutorial: Basics & Examples For Parallel Testing
• @BeforeTest(Setup Method): Here, we have made use of the LamdaTest Desired Capabilities Generator and have set the necessary capabilities of browser name, version, platform, etc., for our Selenium Remote Web Driver. Do refer to our detailed blog that deep dives into the important TestNG annotations that are used for web automation testing.
• @Test(learnSingleInputFieldUsingSelenium): Here, the first Reporter.log statement would print our log only on the emailable report since we haven’t used the logToStandardOut flag. However, the following would print the log both on console output and the emailable report since the logToStandardOut is set to True. Finally, the driver.get statement would open the Selenium Playground website in the Chrome browser launched in the setup method.

  

  Once logged into Selenium Playground, the following steps get the SimpleFormDemo web element and click on the same. The Reporter.log statement used here will log the statement in the emailable report as the current verbosity level, which is 10, set through testng.xml, is greater than the value 2 sent here.

  

  Here, we have made use of XPath in our test case for all the web elements. You can get the XPath of any element by simply doing a right-click on the Element→ Inspect Option. You can also refer to the complete guide on XPath in Selenium for understanding how you can make the most out of XPath for accessing WebElements in the DOM.

  

  Once we are on the Simple Form Demo page, the following steps get the Message Input Box web element and enter the message “Running my first test case using Lambda Test”. Next, we click on the “Show Message” button and retrieve the message displayed, followed by an assert which validates if the entered message and displayed message are equal or not.

  

  The Reporter.log statement here will log the report’s message and print the same on the console output. Thus, the final console output will look something like this:

  

  This is because the emailable report, as mentioned, contains all the messages we logged.

  

  This is how our actual output on the playground looks:

  

• @Test(learnMultipleInputFieldUsingSelenium): Here, the steps to click on the Simple Form Demo Option remain the same as our first test case. However, in this test case, instead of using the single input field, we first enter “2” in the first input box and then repeat the same for the second input box. Later, we click on the “Get Total” button and validate the values we entered.

  

  The final console output looks something like this.

  

  The emailable report will look like this:

  

  The actual output on the playground will look like this:

  

Also Read: Selenium Grid Setup Tutorial: Basics & Examples For Parallel Testing

Watch this video to know more about test result analysis and reporting in Selenium 4. Also, learn about different selenium reporting tools based on ease of setup, pricing, supported report formats, and more.

How to view the logged messages in EmailableReport in TestNG?

Once you have run your test case, refresh your project and go to the test-output folder. You will find an emailable-report.html inside it, which can be viewed using any browser. In addition, the emailable-report.html will have all your messages logged.

Once you open the report, it will look as shown below.

Now if your test fail you can learn how to capture screenshot of failed tests easily through this video.

Conclusion

In this Selenium TestNG tutorial, we learned what is Reporter Class in TestNG and how we can use the different parameters it offers. We also ran our first test script using the Reporter class on Cloud Selenium Grid offered by LamdaTest and logged a few messages. We also learned how we could make use of the Reporter Class in ITestListeners. We got the logs printed on the console and finally saw them getting logged in our EmailableReport. I hope you enjoyed reading this article and learned some more about the TestNG Reporter Log.

Happy Testing!!