Codeception: [Feature request] Executes the given callback within the context of a node

[tortuetorche]

Hi folks,

What are you trying to achieve?

Executes the given callback within the context of a node/element.
-- Capybara doc

Sometimes you may wish to perform several operations while scoping all of the operations within a given selector. For example, you may wish to assert that some text exists only within a table and then click a button within that table.
-- Laravel Dusk doc

Here a sample:

$I->amWithin('.table', function ($table) {
    $table->see('Hello World');
    $table->click('Delete');
});

See:

• http://www.rubydoc.info/github/jnicklas/capybara/Capybara%2FSession%3Awithin
• https://laravel.com/docs/5.4/dusk#scoping-selectors

What do you get instead?

I didn't find any Codeception actions to achieve this feature.

Cheers,
Tortue Torche

[DavertMik]

Yep, we have it in CodeceptJS btw :)

This feature can be implemented but requires a deep look into the WebDriver module. Unlike Dusk we have lots of methods and many lines of code and everything needs to be taken into account when doing a feature like narrowing the search scope.

Let me think on it

[DavertMik]

To be honest it is not hard to implement that technically, but there are problems in displaying the results for such execution. You'd expect the output to look like:

within #form
  I click 'xx'
  I fill field 'yyy'
  I see 'zzz'

however, that doesn't fit into lots of cases: printing HTML report, using it inside Gherkin scenarios, using it inside pageobjects, etc. This feature can be easily implemented if this would be considered as one step:

I execute in context '#form', function

but I don't know how valuable would be that output information.
So the question is to implement it partly (in a bad way) or redesign the output to support this one feature.

[tortuetorche]

Hi Michael,

Thank you for your response, I understand your concern about the output information issue.
Maybe, as a first try, the $I->amWithin()/within() feature could be an extension or an hidden API method like _findElements()?

Have a good day,
Tortue Torche

[DavertMik]

hi @tortuetorche , hey team, I have some ideas with the cleanest implementation.

$I->performOn('#xxxx', ['see' => 'xxx', 'seeElement' => 'zzzz']);
$I->performOn('xxxx', ElementActions::build()->see('xxxx')->click('zzzz'));
$I->performOn('xxxx', (new ElementActions())->click('zzzz'));
// in all this cases second parameter will be array of parameters

$I->performOn('xxx', function(ElementActions $I) {
  $I->see('xxxx');
  $I->click('zzzz');
});
// similar to previous, but a bit uglier output

This produces following output:

I perfrom on 'xxx', {see: 'xxx', seeElement: 'zzzz'}

if second parameter is function, it will be more like (I perfrom on 'xxx', lambda funciton)

This feature won't introduce new changes in reporters, steps, into the Codeception core.
This why I like it for simplicity. For WebDriver it is also possible to set a timeout (wait for element xxx to appear on page before running additional actions).

Right now I think this feature can be implemented for WebDriver.
This will improve performance for calls like

$I->waitForElement('#xxxx');
$I->click('#xxxx');

Not sure if it should be extended to PhpBrowser/Frameworks.
Also it is questionable which actions should be allowed inside an element.

Implementation of this method can be the following:

public function performOn($element, $actions) {
  $actionsArray = $this->elementActionsToArray($actions);
  $this->_setBaseElement($element);
  foreach ($action => $value) {
    call_user_func([$this, $action], $value);
  }
  $this->_setBaseElement(null);
}

So what do you think?

[Naktibalda]

The callback way looks the most natural to me.

[sergeyklay]

Agree with @Naktibalda

[DavertMik]

The callback way looks the most natural to me.

The problem with callback that you can't get a function body inside an output, so it probably won't be as nice. But if a scenario inside a function is long then it probably shouldn't even be included in output.

The array syntax would be good for cases described above:

$I->performOn('#modal', ['see' => 'Are you sure you want to delete this?']);

which will wait for modal to appear and then check the text inside it.

Also I'm not sure performOn is the best name for the function, but I can't find better. Suggestions are welcome