webdriver-manager

What is webdriver-manager?

The webdriver-manager npm package is a tool for managing WebDriver binaries. It is commonly used to download, update, and start WebDriver binaries for Selenium WebDriver, making it easier to set up and manage the necessary components for running automated browser tests.

What are webdriver-manager's main functionalities?

Download WebDriver binaries

This feature allows you to download the necessary WebDriver binaries for your browser. The `update` method fetches the latest versions of the binaries and stores them locally.

const webdriverManager = require('webdriver-manager');
webdriverManager.update();

Start WebDriver server

This feature starts the WebDriver server, which is necessary for running Selenium WebDriver tests. The `start` method launches the server and makes it ready to accept WebDriver commands.

const webdriverManager = require('webdriver-manager');
webdriverManager.start();

Stop WebDriver server

This feature stops the WebDriver server. The `shutdown` method gracefully stops the server, ensuring that all resources are properly released.

const webdriverManager = require('webdriver-manager');
webdriverManager.shutdown();

Other packages similar to webdriver-manager

selenium-standalone

The selenium-standalone package is similar to webdriver-manager in that it helps manage Selenium WebDriver binaries. It provides commands to install, start, and stop the Selenium server. Compared to webdriver-manager, selenium-standalone offers more flexibility in configuring the Selenium server and supports a wider range of browsers and versions.

chromedriver

The chromedriver package is specifically designed to manage the ChromeDriver binary. It allows you to download, update, and start the ChromeDriver server. While it is more limited in scope compared to webdriver-manager, it is a good choice if you only need to work with Chrome.

geckodriver

The geckodriver package is similar to chromedriver but is focused on managing the GeckoDriver binary for Firefox. It provides functionality to download, update, and start the GeckoDriver server. Like chromedriver, it is more specialized and limited in scope compared to webdriver-manager.

README

webdriver-manager

• Use as a dependency
• Use as a command line interface
• The command line interface help commands
• Environment variables

Use as a dependency

To install this as a dependency: npm install -D webdriver-manager. The following is an example running webdriver-manager as a dependency. The test downloads the providers and starts the selenium server standalone as detached. After the test, it will shutdown the selenium server standalone.

import {
  Options,
  setLogLevel,
  shutdown,
  start,
  update,
} from 'webdriver-manager';

const options: Options = {
  browserDrivers: [{
    name: 'chromedriver'     // For browser drivers, we just need to use a valid
                             // browser driver name. Other possible values
                             // include 'geckodriver' and 'iedriver'.
  }],
  server: {
    name: 'selenium',
    runAsNode: true,          // If we want to run as a node. By default
                              // running as detached will set this to true.
    runAsDetach: true         // To run this in detached. This returns the
                              // process back to the parent process.
  }
};
setLogLevel('info');          // Required if we webdriver-manager to log to
                              // console. Not setting this will hide the logs.

describe('some web test', () => {
  beforeAll(async () => {
    await update(options);
    await start(options);
  });

  it('should run some web test', async () => {
    // Your async / await web test with some framework.
  });

  afterAll(async () => {
    await shutdown(options);  // Makes the web request to shutdown the server.
                              // If we do not call shutdown, the java command
                              // will still be running the server on port 4444.
  });
});

Use as a command line interface

npm i -g webdriver-manager

webdriver-manager update      // Downloads the latest binaries.
webdriver-manager start       // Starts the selenium server standalone.

Note: Installing globally will not work with Protractor if you are trying to start a Selenium Standalone server with a "local" or "directConnect". It will not work for these since Protractor is looking files downloaded locally to the project.

The command line interface help commands

To get a list of commands for webdriver-manager, use the help flag.

webdriver-manager --help
webdriver-manager [command]

Commands:
  webdriver-manager clean     Removes downloaded files from the out_dir.
  webdriver-manager shutdown  Shutdown a local selenium server with GET request
  webdriver-manager start     Start up the selenium server.
  webdriver-manager status    List the current available binaries.
  webdriver-manager update    Install or update selected binaries.

Options:
  --version  Show version number                                       [boolean]
  --help     Show help                                                 [boolean]

To get a list of options that can be passed to the webdriver-manager update command, use the help flag.

webdriver-manager update --help
webdriver-manager update

Install or update selected binaries.

Options:
  --version              Show version number                           [boolean]
  --help                 Show help                                     [boolean]
  --out_dir              Location of output.                            [string]
  --chrome               Install or update chromedriver.
                                                       [boolean] [default: true]
  --gecko                Install or update geckodriver.[boolean] [default: true]
  --github_token         Use a GitHub token to prevent rate limit issues.
                                                                        [string]
  --iedriver             Install or update ie driver. [boolean] [default: false]
  --ignore_ssl           Ignore SSL certificates.                      [boolean]
  --log_level            The log level of this CLI.   [string] [default: "info"]
  --proxy                Use a proxy server to download files.          [string]
  --standalone           Install or update selenium server standalone.
                                                       [boolean] [default: true]
  --versions.chrome      The chromedriver version.                      [string]
  --versions.gecko       The geckodriver version.                       [string]
  --versions.ie          The ie driver version.                         [string]
  --versions.standalone  The selenium server standalone version.        [string]