Enhancements: Easy Syntax highlighting and video tutorials needed.

[SMERSH009X]

Hi,

From my experience so far, and other QA Engineers I've talked to Robot's usability and learning curve are in need of enhancement.

For example, I want to be able to simply type out some tests into a text file, like below and have there be syntax highlighting. Ideally this would be done through an Eclipse plugin. Please see screenshot below of how easy it was to write basic Selenium tests before using a framework, and note the syntax highlighting.

*** Settings ***
Library        D:\\Temp\\1TestingApps\\Selenium\\Robot\\lib\\MyLibrary1.py


*** Testcases ***   
            
Print Text  text_print  Guy
Sleep  timec  10

Also, the learning curve for Robot is incredibly steep. I think this is mainly due to lack of video tutorials. If you want to see video tutorials done right for a framework, check out the ones for Fitnesse on their homepage. Can we please get some video tutorials? I think it would drive up the Robot userbase as well.
Thanks

[Pekka Klärck]

2011/7/29 SMERSH009X <smers...@gmail.com>

>
> For example, I want to be able to simply type out some tests into a text file, like below and have there be syntax highlighting. Ideally this would be done through an Eclipse plugin.

RIDE [1] does syntax highlighting (among other things) and there are
also syntax highlights for Emacs [2] and Vim [3]. Eclipse plugin would
be great too but nobody has yet contributed anything.

[1] http://code.google.com/p/robotframework-ride/
[2] http://github.com/sakari/robot-mode
[3] http://github.com/mfukar/robotframework-vim

> Also, the learning curve for Robot is incredibly steep. I think this is mainly due to lack of video tutorials. If you want to see video tutorials done right for a framework, check out the ones for Fitnesse on their homepage. Can we please get some video tutorials? I think it would drive up the Robot userbase as well.

I agree having videos would be great but think that having more simple
examples would be even better. Both have been on my todo list for ages
and hopefully something happens during autumn. If someone is
interested to help let me know!

Cheers,
.peke
--
Agile Tester/Developer/Consultant :: http://eliga.fi
Lead Developer of Robot Framework :: http://robotframework.org

[SMERSH009X]

On Tuesday, August 2, 2011 2:54:56 PM UTC-7, Pekka Klärck wrote:

2011/7/29 SMERSH009X <smers...@gmail.com>
>
> For example, I want to be able to simply type out some tests into a text file, like below and have there be syntax highlighting. Ideally this would be done through an Eclipse plugin.

RIDE [1] does syntax highlighting (among other things) and there are
also syntax highlights for Emacs [2] and Vim [3]. Eclipse plugin would
be great too but nobody has yet contributed anything.

[1] http://code.google.com/p/robotframework-ride/

Can you please show me a screenshot of Ride working like a Texteditor with ALL the code layed out on one page, not grouped by testcase, like in my Screenshot of eclipse?

 I couldn't figure out how to do that.

[2] http://github.com/sakari/robot-mode
[3] http://github.com/mfukar/robotframework-vim

I use windows and these Unix-y applications have learning curves of their own. I just want a simple text editor with keyword highlighting, and perhaps autocomplete.

 

> Also, the learning curve for Robot is incredibly steep. I think this is mainly due to lack of video tutorials. If you want to see video tutorials done right for a framework, check out the ones for Fitnesse on their homepage. Can we please get some video tutorials? I think it would drive up the Robot userbase as well.

I agree having videos would be great but think that having more simple
examples would be even better. Both have been on my todo list for ages
and hopefully something happens during autumn. If someone is
interested to help let me know!

 I can potentially help. If you tell me over Skype or over email, the exact steps of these "simple examples" i can record some vids to put up on youtube.

[SMERSH009X]

Ahh just saw that Jussi has created a syntax highlighting for a Mac app. https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/robotframework-users/4Eug1GFY80M
Do you guys think you can dedicate a release purely to making Robot more usable? Even a basic Eclipse syntax highlighter with no learning curve would be so great.
Thank you

[g28]

I am doing syntax highlights using Notepad++ by redefining the
keywords.

For example:

Click Element xpath=//*[@id="NewBtn"]

turns into

fClickElement xpath=//*[@id="NewBtn"]

with keyword redefined as

fClickElement
[Arguments] ${1}= ${2}= ${3}=
Click Element ${1} ${2} ${3}


Now that I have the multiple word keywords from RobotFramework
redefined as a single word then syntax highlighting becomes easy. I
choose Notepad++ simply because of this ability and you can do
highlighting for the entire line for comments as well.

It would have been MUCH easier if all of the keywords used in
RobotFramework were single words then most editors would work easier.


On Aug 15, 10:22 am, SMERSH009X <smersh0...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Ahh just saw that Jussi has created a syntax highlighting for a Mac app.https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/robotframework-users/4Eug1GFY80M

[David]

A JEdit syntax highlighter would be nice too...

On Aug 15, 8:22 am, SMERSH009X <smersh0...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Ahh just saw that Jussi has created a syntax highlighting for a Mac app.https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/robotframework-users/4Eug1GFY80M

[Mikko Korpela]

"Even a basic Eclipse syntax highlighter with no learning curve would be so great."

Eclipse has a nice tool for creating editors+compilers etc. called Xtext that could be used for building Eclipse based syntax highlighter for Robot Framework.

There are some basic problems in Robot Grammar that are tricky:
- The keywords can contain spaces
- There are multiple syntax formats

The "no learning curve" part is something that I don't think can be achieved.
Robot Framework is a tool that solves a problem efficiently when mastered -- it is not a consumer product that aims to be accessible to everyone immediately. Although good Robot Framework tests are easy to understand by people that know the domain, it is still required that persons that can express there ideas in a clear way write the tests -- and this means work.

I do agree that Robot Framework is missing some learning material. The videos would be very useful for people to get started with Robot Framework.

[Pekka Klärck]

2011/8/15 g28 <koh...@gmail.com>:

>
> It would have been MUCH easier if all of the keywords used in
> RobotFramework were single words then most editors would work easier.

Notice that keywords are both case and space insensitive so you can
use e.g. 'ClickElement' instead of 'Click Element'.

Cheers,
.peke

PS: I fully agree that Robot syntax highlighting and auto-completion
support for more text editors would be great. Hopefully users with
experience in Notepad++, JEDit, etc. could contribute something!

[g28]

This is great because I just started a few days ago creating redefines
specifically so I can do sytax highlighting.

On another note I bet I tried 10+ text editors to see how well they do
syntax highlighting and I ended up picking notepad++ because of how
easy it is to setup and comments look for a word then highlight the
entire line (no other tool would do it this way).

g28

On Aug 16, 4:24 am, Pekka Klärck <p...@iki.fi> wrote:
> 2011/8/15 g28 <kohr...@gmail.com>: