Mercury QuickTest Professional 9.1 Readme
This file provides the following information about QuickTest Professional:
Overview
Welcome to QuickTest Professional, the Mercury automated keyword-driven testing solution. By mirroring end-user behavior, QuickTest Professional creates interactive customizable tests or components that simplify and shorten the testing cycle.
QuickTest Professional enables you to test standard Windows applications, Web objects, ActiveX controls, and Visual Basic applications. You can also test special environments using additional QuickTest add-ins, such as the Java, Oracle, SAP Solutions, .NET Windows and Web Forms, Siebel, PeopleSoft, Web Services, and Terminal Emulator Add-ins.
QuickTest Professional is Unicode-compliant, and supports Unicode 2.0, UTF-8, and UTF-16.
QuickTest Professional supports working with the following Mercury applications:
Customer Support
Technical support for QuickTest Professional is provided via our award-winning Customer Support Web Site. From this Web site, customers are able to review Frequently Asked Questions, submit and check the status of support requests, and access online documentation, patches, and other downloads. Please visit the Customer Support Web Site at:
Customer Support contact numbers all over the world are available at:
http://support.mercury.com/cgi-bin/portal/CSO/contacts.jsp.
System Requirements
To successfully install and run QuickTest Professional, you need to meet the following system requirements:
Note: Performance has not been optimized for the minimum system configuration. For best performance, your system should be configured using at least the recommended levels.
Supported Add-ins
The following specific add-in versions are supported with QuickTest Professional 9.1:
- QuickTest Professional Java Add-in 9.1
- QuickTest Professional .NET Add-in 9.1
- QuickTest Professional Oracle Add-in 8.2
- QuickTest Professional PeopleSoft Add-in 8.2*
- QuickTest Professional Add-in 8.2 for SAP Solutions
- QuickTest Professional Siebel Add-in 8.0*
- QuickTest Professional Stingray Add-in 8.2
- QuickTest Professional Terminal Emulator Add-in 8.0*
- QuickTest Professional VisualAge Smalltalk Add-in 8.2
- QuickTest Professional Web Services Add-in 9.1
Note: You cannot use any other add-ins or add-in version with QuickTest Professional 9.1, except for those listed above.
* PeopleSoft Add-in 8.2, Siebel Add-in 8.0, and Terminal Emulator Add-in 8.0 all require an Add-in Upgrade patch before you can use them with QuickTest Professional 9.1. You can install Add-in Upgrade patches by running the relevant patch executable from the <QuickTest Professional>\AddinsUpgrade folder.
For more information and instructions, refer to the QuickTest Professional Installation Guide.
Supported Environments and Programs
QuickTest Professional supports creating, recording, and running tests or components using the environments and programs described below.
Standard Windows Applications
QuickTest Professional supports testing on applications based on Win32 API and MFC. QuickTest Professional does not support testing on 64-bit applications.
Visual Basic Applications
QuickTest Professional supports testing on Visual Basic 6.0 applications.
Note: Visual Basic .NET applications are supported by the QuickTest Professional .NET Add-in.
Browsers
- Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 Service Pack 1
- Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0 Beta 3
- Netscape Browser 8.0
- Mozilla Firefox 1.5
- Mozilla Firefox 2.0 Alpha 3 (Alpha-level support for Bon Echo 2.0a3)
To work with QuickTest and Bon Echo, select the Firefox 1.5 option where required in QuickTest, for example, in the Web tab of the Record and Run Settings dialog box.ActiveX Grid Controls
In addition to basic support of ActiveX properties and methods, QuickTest Professional supports context-sensitive recording and verification on the following ActiveX Grid controls:
ActiveX Calendar Controls
In addition to built-in support for ActiveX properties and methods, QuickTest Professional supports context-sensitive recording and verification on the following ActiveX Calendar controls:
Name ProgId Microsoft Date and Time Picker Control 6.0 (SP4) MSComCtl2.DTPicker.2 Microsoft MonthView Control 6.0 (SP4) MSComCtl2.MonthView.2Microsoft Excel
When using Microsoft Excel files with QuickTest Professional (for example, to import or export data to or from the Data Table), you can work with Microsoft Excel 2000, 2002, 2003, and XP.
Microsoft Query
When using Microsoft Query with QuickTest Professional (for example, for Database checkpoints), you can work with Microsoft Query 2000, 2002, 2003, and XP.
Additional Environments
QuickTest Professional add-ins support other environments such as Java, .NET Windows and Web Forms, SAP Solutions, Oracle, Siebel, PeopleSoft, VisualAge Smalltalk, Stingray, Web Services, and terminal emulator applications. For more information on QuickTest Professional add-ins, refer to the relevant add-in documentation.
Useful Information
- You must be logged on with administrator privileges to install QuickTest Professional.
- To use QuickTest Professional's debugging capabilities, you must install the Microsoft Script Debugger. The Script Debugger can be installed during the QuickTest Professional setup or can be downloaded later from Microsoft's Windows Script Technologies site: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/downloads/list/webdev.asp. It can also be installed using the Add/Remove Windows Components option in the Add/Remove Programs window.
- To play the new feature video demonstrations, you must first install the TechSmith video codec. Choose Help > Product Feature Movies > Install TechSmith Video Codec to install the TechSmith Screen Capture Codec (TSCC).
- If you are using concurrent licenses with QuickTest Professional 9.1, you must install version 9.0 of the Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server. QuickTest Professional 9.1 is not compatible with earlier versions of the Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server.
- If certain object property values in your Web site or application are generated dynamically for all objects of a given type, you can create a property pattern configuration file that instructs QuickTest Professional to automatically record the object property as a regular expression. For detailed instructions about how to use the Property Pattern feature, see PropPattern.htm located in the <QuickTest Professional installation>\help folder.
- There are several ways to improve performance and minimize disk space when using QuickTest Professional. For more information, refer to the QuickTest Professional User's Guide.
- For more information about QuickTest Professional:
- Important installation information and step-by-step installation instructions can be found in the QuickTest Professional Installation Guide. The QuickTest Professional Installation Guide is available in PDF format in the root folder of your CD-ROM. You can also find it in the <QuickTest Professional\help> folder after you install QuickTest.
- If you are using QuickTest Professional for the first time, use the QuickTest Professional Tutorial (Help > QuickTest Professional Tutorial) to learn how to work with the most commonly used features.
- The What's New Help (Help > What's New) provides information about new features and supported environments in this version of QuickTest Professional.
- Detailed information about QuickTest Professional can be found in the QuickTest Professional User's Guide and QuickTest Professional Object Model Reference. These are available with a combined index and text search, along with the Microsoft VBScript Reference, from the Help menu (Help > QuickTest Professional Help). The QuickTest Professional User's Guide is also available in PDF format in the <QuickTest Professional installation>\help folder.
- The QuickTest Professional Automation Object Model Reference is available from the QuickTest Professional Start menu program folder and from the Help menu (Help > QuickTest Professional Help > QuickTest Advanced References > QuickTest Automation). It provides syntax, descriptive information, and examples for the automation objects, methods, and properties. It also contains a detailed overview to help you get started writing QuickTest automation scripts.
Note: You must have Adobe® Reader® installed on your computer to open the printer-friendly (PDF format) versions of the QuickTest Professional documentation. You can download Adobe Reader at: www.adobe.com.
Documentation Updates
Some of the QuickTest Professional PDF and Help files installed with QuickTest Professional contain incorrect information about add-in licenses. The Add-in Manager dialog box description in the installed documentation also does not contain complete information about all of the options in the dialog box.
The following information replaces any conflicting information in the QuickTest Professional PDF and Help files:
It is recommended to download the updated QuickTest Professional 9.1 documentation set from the Mercury Customer Support Web site and to copy the updated files to your QuickTest Help folder as described in the QuickTest Professional 9.1 Documentation Set Readme file included with the downloaded zip file.
Known Problems and Limitations
This section includes information on:
Installation
- The path in which installation files for QuickTest Professional and/or external add-ins are located, and the path in which QuickTest Professional and/or external add-ins are installed, can contain only English characters.
- When installing over QuickTest Professional 6.5 or later, you can continue to use your current seat or concurrent license key. However, if you want to use the new commuter license feature available with the Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server, version 7.6 or later, you must install a new license key on the concurrent license server. Contact Mercury Interactive Customer Support to receive a new license key.
- The Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server does not support the use of Network Address Translation (NAT).
- You cannot install QuickTest Professional with a demo license over a previous version of QuickTest Professional whose demo license has expired and a regular license was never installed for it.
- If the LSHOST variable was set to a server on another domain, the server utility lsmon.exe might behave unexpectedly.
- The concurrent license does not include a demo license and does not work without a Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server and license key installed.
- You cannot change the license type from seat to concurrent or vice versa when logged into the machine without administrator privileges.
Workaround: To change the license type, log into the machine as a user with administrator privileges.
- Uninstalling the QuickTest Professional Floating License Server version 6.0 may cause QuickTest to fail to retrieve a license during startup.
Workaround: Back up the lservrc file before uninstalling the QuickTest Professional Floating License Server version 6.0 and then copy the file to the new installation path or reinstall the license strings after installing the license server.
- If version 6.0.0.8169 of Pdm.dll is found on your computer, we recommend installing a newer version from: http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q293/6/23.ASP. This will be recognized during installation and QuickTest Professional will instruct you to download the corrected DLL from the Microsoft site.
- If you install QuickTest Professional on a computer that also has Microsoft HTML Help Workshop installed, you may receive the following error message when you try to compile a help project in Microsoft HTML Help Workshop: The file itircl.dll has not been registered correctly.
Workaround: Look for itcc.dll on your system (in \windows\system or \winnt\system32). If you find it, register it using regsvr32.exe. If the itcc.dll is not on your system at all, you can download a copy from: http://www.mvps.org/htmlhelpcenter/htmlhelp/hhtips.html#hhc6003. You may have to restart your computer before using HTML Help Workshop again.
- Installing QuickTest Professional on a network drive is not supported.
- When working with a terminal server (for example, Windows 2000 Server or Windows 2003 Server), you must connect to QuickTest using a concurrent license. Seat and demo licenses are not supported on terminal servers.
Workaround: Install a concurrent license server on the terminal server and then connect to it, or connect to a concurrent license server that is installed on a different computer.
- When uninstalling QuickTest Professional in Windows 2003, the uninstall program may stop responding in the "removing backup files" stage.
Workaround: End the msiexec.exe and Ikernel.exe processes from the Windows Task Manager and restart your computer. If this problem occurs during the installation process, end the msiexec.exe and Ikernel.exe processes from the Windows Task Manager and re-run the Setup (installation) program.
- When uninstalling QuickTest Professional in Windows 2003, the uninstall program may not complete successfully, indicating that the uninstall process could not be completed and QuickTest Professional should be uninstalled manually. This behavior occurs due to a bug that was introduced in InstallShield Developer 8.02. For more details, see http://support.installshield.com/kb/view.asp?articleid=Q111000.
Workaround: After performing an uninstall, manually delete any files that remain in the QuickTest Professional installation folder.
- If you have external 6.5.x add-ins that were installed directly on QuickTest Professional 8.0.x or later (and were not installed previously on QuickTest Professional 6.5.x), the uninstall program does not uninstall these add-ins.
Workaround: After performing an uninstall, manually delete any files that remain in the QuickTest Professional installation folder.
- An internal error (error number 0x80040707) may occur during the installation process, due to a known issue with InstallShield. Solutions for Windows XP and Windows 2003 are provided below. For more information on this error and other possible solutions, see http://consumer.installshield.com/kb.asp?id=q108167
Workaround for Windows XP: Run the installation by right-clicking the setup.exe file and selecting Run as. Clear the Protect my computer and data from unauthorized program activity check box. Click OK and continue the installation process as usual.
Workaround for Windows 2003: Run the installation by right-clicking the setup.exe file and selecting Run as. Click Run in the displayed message box, then clear the Run this program with restricted access check box. Click OK and continue the installation process as usual.
- Uninstalling an add-in does not cause dependent add-ins to be uninstalled. For example, you can uninstall the Web Add-in without affecting the installation of the Siebel Add-in. However, the Web Add-in must be installed to load and use the Siebel Add-in.
- If the error "1628 Failed to compete installation" is displayed during a patch installation, check that you are not attempting to install a patch on a product that is not actually installed, for example, an add-in patch for a version of an add-in that is not installed.
Forward Compatibility
Working with Windows Vista
- When installing QuickTest Professional on Windows Vista Beta 2, the QuickTest icon is not installed on your desktop or in the Start menu. (A default icon is installed instead.)
Workaround: Modify the icon manually.
- QuickTest Professional does not support the recording of operations on the Start menu of Windows Vista Beta 2.
- The security settings in Windows Vista Beta 2 may prevent you from connecting to a Quality Center project (either directly or from QuickTest Professional). This can occur when the User Account Control (UAC) option in Windows Vista is set to ON, and you have not yet connected to a Quality Center project.
Workaround: To work with Quality Center, temporarily turn off the User Account Control (UAC) option, as follows:
- Log in to Windows Vista as an administrator.
- From the Control Panel, choose User Accounts > Change Security Settings.
- Clear the Use User Account Control (UAC) to help protect your computer check box and click OK.
- Connect to Quality Center as usual. After connecting to Quality Center, you can turn the User Account Control (UAC) option on again. Hereafter, you should be able to connect to Quality Center, as needed.
- When working with Internet Explorer 7.0 Beta 3, QuickTest Professional may not recognize Web objects, even though the Web Add-in is installed and loaded.
Workaround: In Internet Explorer 7.0 Beta 3, choose Tools > Internet Options. In the Security tab, clear the Enable Protected Mode check box and click OK.
- Due to a problem opening DCOM permissions on Windows Vista Beta 2, QuickTest does not run properly on a remote Windows Vista Beta 2 host from Quality Center.
Workaround: Run RmtAgentFix.exe from the <QuickTest installation>\bin folder.
Creating and Running Tests or Components
- When choosing Record and run test on any open Web browser in the Web tab of the Record and Run Settings dialog box, the browser must be opened after you open QuickTest Professional. Otherwise, QuickTest will not record and run tests properly.
- QuickTest Professional does not support the recording of drag-and-drop operations on Web (HTML) objects.
- QuickTest Professional uses Microsoft Regular Expressions, in which the character . represents any character except \n. In older versions of QuickTest Professional, this character represented any character.
Workaround: Change the . character to [.\n].
- In the Step Generator, if you add a method that returns an object and the assignment in the test or component is missing a Set statement, the run session will fail.
- The behavior of the Timeout argument of the Exist method was changed between QuickTest version 6.5 and version 8.x. In version 8.x and later, it behaves as follows:
- If a timeout value is specified, QuickTest waits until it finds the object or until the timeout is reached.
- If the value 0 is specified, the method returns the True or False value immediately.
- For tests, if no value is specified, the value specified in the Test Settings dialog box for the Object Synchronization Timeout is used. For components, the default setting of 20 seconds is used.
To return to the 6.5 default behavior (default timeout is zero):
- Add a 0 value for the timeout argument for all Exist statements.
- Use the RegisterUserFunc statement in a library file to modify the behavior of Exist to equal Exist(0) and then associate the library file with all relevant tests.
Note: It is not recommended to set the Object Synchronization Timeout to 0, as this will prevent QuickTest from recognizing objects that take time to load. Additionally, there are other methods that use the Object Synchronization Timeout as the default value, such as WaitProperty and Sync.
- If you create a test containing a virtual object and run it with different screen resolution settings, operations on the virtual object may not be performed correctly.
- If you select On errors for the Save step screen capture to results option in the Run tab of the Options dialog box, then no screen captures (including errors) are saved to the results for non-Web based applications.
Workaround: Select On errors and warnings for the Save step screen capture to results when testing standard Windows applications.
- When running a QuickTest test from a Quality Center test set, or using QuickTest automation, the When error occurs during run session setting (File > Settings > Run tab) is ignored. Instead, QuickTest automatically continues to the next step when an error occurs. If you want to change this setting, contact Mercury Customer Support for more information.
- QuickTest does not record launching Windows Help from the Start menu.
- When the title of a window changes during recording, QuickTest may fail to recognize objects within that window while running the test or component.
Workaround: Remove the text property from the window's test object description in the Object Repository dialog box.
- Errors during the run session produce more than one error node in the results.
- The GetItemProperty method may not correctly return the text property value for WinComboBox, WinList, WinListView, VbComboBox, VbList, and VbListView test objects.
Workaround: Use the GetItem method to retrieve the text property value for these test objects.
- Running a test or component that contains a For Each statement that iterates on the ParameterDefinitions collection may fail if the collection was retrieved directly before using the For Each statement.
Workaround: Use other VBScript loop statements, such as For or While.
- Prior to QuickTest 9.0, if you specified a path for a resource starting with \.., it was considered to be a relative path. In QuickTest 9.0 and later, a path that starts with \.. is considered to be a full path, with the backslash representing the root folder of the current drive.
If you defined paths starting with \.. using earlier versions of QuickTest, you should change the path to be a standard relative path by removing the backslash (\).
- When you change the focus to a cell in the Operation column of the Keyword View, a tooltip is not displayed.
- It is recommended not to use the VBScript On Error Resume Next statement, because it may interfere with the built-in error handling mechanism in QuickTest.
Workaround: Perform error handling in QuickTest using the Run tab of the Test Settings dialog box or use the OnError property of the RunSettings object through automation.
- If a test containing an On Error Resume Next statement calls a function that does not contain a separate On Error Resume Next statement, no VBScript error handling will be applied if an error occurs within the function. In earlier versions of QuickTest, On Error Resume Next statements worked correctly in this situation.
Workaround: Use QuickTest built-in error handling, or if needed, use On Error Resume Next within the function body. If you require additional information, contact Mercury Customer Support.
- The MouseMove method may behave unexpectedly in a VMware environment.
Workaround: Add the following line to the VMware configuration file (<VM name>.vmx): vmmouse.present = "FALSE"
For more information, refer to the VMware support article, number 1691 - "Unexpected Cursor Behavior in Windows Virtual Machine with "Snap To" Mouse Control Panel Option Enabled", at: http://www.vmware.com/support/kb/enduser/std_alp.php.
- When running QuickTest on a remote machine using a Remote Desktop Connection session (RDC), steps that contain keyboard or focus operations may fail if the Remote Desktop Connection session is minimized during the run session.
Workaround: If you are using a Remote Desktop Connection session to run a test or component, do not minimize the Remote Desktop Connection session window.
- You cannot create a call to a new action called Global, since Global is the name reserved for the Global sheet in the Data Table. If you create an action called Global, you will not be able to select the local or global data sheet when parameterizing a test object property.
- Integration with SAP eCATT is not supported. To obtain a patch that provides SAP eCATT support, contact Mercury Customer Support.
- If you define a VBScript class, it can be called only within the QuickTest action or function library in which you defined it.
Creating and Running Tests and Components on Web Objects
- If you need to test applications using Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0 Beta 3, it is recommended to create the required tests or components using Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 and then run them on Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0 Beta 3.
- If you record a click on an area of an image map that is not mapped to a URL in Microsoft Internet Explorer, QuickTest Professional will perform a click on the first mapped area of that map during the run session.
- QuickTest Professional records changes in the edit field only on <input type="file"> tags. Browsing operations are not recorded.
- Clicks on form tags of type POST may not run correctly.
Workaround: If this problem occurs, change the ReplayType before the click to Run by mouse operations using: Setting.WebPackage("ReplayType") = 2. It is recommended to return the replay type to the default (Run by Events) setting after the click step: Setting.WebPackage("ReplayType") = 1.
- QuickTest Professional does not record on the Search frame of the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser.
- QuickTest Professional does not record on the Find window of the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser.
- If you record on the AutoComplete dialog for password fields using the Tab key, QuickTest Professional may record incorrectly.
Workaround: Press Enter after entering the user name or click the button for logging in.
- When working with Web objects, if a property defined for a Description object is not supported (for example, the property name is misspelled), the property name is not ignored. Therefore a <WebObject>.ChildObjects statement using that Description object will fail.
Running Tests or Components in Netscape Browser or Mozilla Firefox
- QuickTest Professional does not support the Netscape Browser menu.
- The .Object property for Web objects is not supported for Netscape Browser or Mozilla Firefox in this version of QuickTest.
- QuickTest Professional cannot run tests or components on Netscape Browser when Netscape Browser is in minimized mode.
- The Object Spy and Checkpoint Properties dialog boxes do not retrieve the current value of edit boxes in Netscape Browser and Mozilla Firefox dialog boxes.
- The Type property of the WebButton test object has a different default value in Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Browser or Mozilla Firefox. In Microsoft Internet Explorer the default value is Button, but in Netscape Browser or Mozilla Firefox the default value is Submit.
Workaround: Do not use the Type property in the description of a WebButton test object.
- Standard checkpoints on links are not supported for running on Netscape Browser or Mozilla Firefox.
Creating and Running Tests and Components on Standard Windows Objects
- You cannot insert a checkpoint on a WinMenu object.
Workaround: Use the GetItemProperty method to retrieve and verify the menu items.
- If you record using Windows logo key shortcuts, the recording may be inaccurate.
Workaround: Use the Start menu instead of the Windows logo key when recording.
- Changing the style of a WinCalendar (from single selection to multi-selection, for example) will cause the run session to fail.
- When using the pointing hand mechanism from the Object Spy to point on MFC static text or tab controls, QuickTest may fail to return the correct object.
Workaround: Add the object to the object repository. To do this, point to the object's parent window, select the parent window object in the Object Selection dialog box, click OK, and perform one of the following in the Define Object Filter dialog box:
- Select the All object types option to add all of the objects in the parent window to the object repository.
- Select the Selected object types option, click the Select button, and then choose the specific object type(s) you want to add to the object repository.
After you add the object to the object repository, you can use the GetROProperty method to retrieve its run-time properties. For example:
width = Dialog("Login").Static("Agent Name:").GetROProperty("width")
MsgBox widthCreating and Running Tests and Components on Visual Basic Applications
- When working with the Visual Basic Add-in, it is recommended to choose the Record and run on these applications (opened on session start) option and then to specify the application name in the Windows Applications tab of the Record and Run settings dialog box.
If you choose the Record and run test on any open Windows-based application option, you should open the Visual Basic application after the first time you start recording.
- Combobox objects of style Simple Combobox are not supported.
Creating and Running Tests and Components on ActiveX Controls
- ActiveX objects inside Netscape Browser are not supported.
- If QuickTest Professional does not recognize an ActiveX control inside a Web page, reduce the security level within your Microsoft Internet Explorer browser.
- If an ActiveX control's internal properties have the same name as ActiveX properties created by QuickTest Professional, retrieval and verification of such properties may be problematic.
Workaround: You can access the internal properties of ActiveX control using the Object property.
- Methods performed on row and column positions for Apex, DataBound, and Sheridan grids return the values of the visible positions and not the absolute positions within the tables.
Workaround: Use the scroll bar while recording in order to display the required cells.
- When recording on an ActiveX control, wait for the recorded step to appear before moving the mouse. Moving the mouse too quickly may result in a corrupted Active Screen for that step.
- The AcxTable.RowCount method is not supported for the Microsoft Data Bound Grid control.
- QuickTest may fail to properly capture some of the internal properties of windowless ActiveX controls, such as x, y, height, and width.
- Recording on windowless ActiveX controls may result in some additional steps added to your test or component (such as a Click method in addition to a Set method on an AcxRadioButton object). These additional steps will not cause the run session to fail.
- Drag and Drop operations on windowless ActiveX controls are not supported.
- QuickTest may fail to recognize windowless ActiveX controls identified by programmatic descriptions.
Workaround: Add Windowless=True to the programmatic description.
Example:
set myButton = Description.Create
myButton("progid").Value = "Forms.CommandButton.1"
myButton("Windowless").Value = True
Dialog("ActiveX Collection Client").AcxButton(myButton).Click
Text Recognition
The QuickTest text recognition mechanism is obsolete and should not be used.
The text recognition mechanism was used in past versions of QuickTest for text checkpoints or output value steps on Windows-based objects and also for the GetVisibleText and GetTextLocation methods. These features and methods are no longer available for Windows-based environments.
If an existing test already contains a step that uses text recognition, or if you need to capture text from your application for a new step, use one of the following as an alternative for checking or retrieving text:
- Instead of text checkpoints and output value steps-Create a standard checkpoint or output value and select to check or output the text (or equivalent) property instead of creating text (or text area) checkpoints or output values on Windows-based applications (Standard Windows, Visual Basic, ActiveX, .NET Windows Forms) and Terminal Emulator (non-HLLAPI) environments.
- Instead of GetVisibleText and GetTextLocation-Use the GetROProperty method or the Object property to retrieve the value of the text (or equivalent) property from an object in your application instead of GetVisibleText and GetTextLocation methods.
For more information on the above options, refer to the QuickTest Professional User's Guide and the QuickTest Professional Object Model Reference. You can also find more information in the online knowledge base on the Mercury Customer Support Web site (http://support.mercury.com).
Notes:
Steps using text recognition are supported only for tests created in QuickTest version 6.5 or earlier and where the step ran successfully in version 6.5 in the identical testing environment (for example, same computer, operating system, service pack, installed toolkits, application APIs). The text recognition mechanism is not supported for new tests or when trying to run a 6.5 or earlier test on a different testing environment.
Text checkpoints on Web-based objects do not use the text recognition mechanism, and are therefore fully supported.Active Screen
- When recording on WinMenu objects, the Active Screen is not captured.
- When the Active Screen displays a Java applet or ActiveX control within a Web page, the applet or control is for viewing purposes only and you cannot perform operations (for example, create checkpoints, add methods, and so forth) on the object.
Workaround: Record an operation on the Java applet/ActiveX control to create a step on the object with the ActiveX Add-in and/or Java Add-in (available separately) loaded. Then you can create a checkpoint, parameterize a step, or add a method from the individual Java applet/ActiveX control in the Active Screen.
Automation
- Using an automation script to open a test created using QuickTest 8.2 or earlier may take some time since the test is automatically converted to the QuickTest 9.1 format. Note that when opening a test in this way, you cannot choose whether or not to convert it. Tests are automatically converted to the new format and cannot be opened in earlier versions of QuickTest after they have been converted and saved.
- The SetObjectRepositoryAsDefault method and ObjectRepositoryPath property path are no longer supported.
Workaround: Update your automation scripts to use the methods and properties of the ObjectRepositories collection instead. For more information, refer to (Help > QuickTest Professional Help > QuickTest Advanced References > QuickTest Automation).
Data Table
- If you import a Microsoft Excel table containing a combo box or list cells, conditional formatting, or other special cell formats, the formats are not imported and the cells are displayed in the Data Table with fixed values.
- Entering a very large number in the Data Table may cause unexpected behavior.
Checkpoints and Output Values
- Checkpoints that contain more than 64K of data may run slowly.
- The Focused property in a checkpoint inserted while recording will always have the value False.
Workaround: Change the value of the property manually or perform an update run operation on the test or component.
- Checkpoints on page source/HTML tags cannot be inserted from the Active Screen and must be inserted while recording. These checkpoints may fail during the first run session.
Workaround: Perform an update run (Automation> Update Run Mode) of your test or component before you run a test or component that includes a page source/HTML tag checkpoint.
- If you insert checkpoints from the Active Screen when you are working with an application containing a browser control rather than with a Web browser, your checkpoints may fail.
Workaround: Insert checkpoints while recording.
- When inserting a checkpoint from the Active Screen on a VbComboBox object that checks the sellength or seltext property, the captured value may be incorrect.
Workaround: Update the value manually.
- Checkpoints are not supported for WinComboBox objects of style Simple Combobox.
- When you create a standard checkpoint for a Calendar control (for WinCalendar, AcxCalendar, and SwfCalendar test objects), the Date and Time properties are not selected by default.
- ActiveX table checkpoints capture only visible rows in data bound grids.
- When you insert a checkpoint on an ActiveX table from the Active Screen, the browser (or application) must be open to the same page (or screen). Otherwise, some data from the ActiveX table will be missing.
Workaround: Create ActiveX table checkpoints while recording.
- Checkpoints and output values for ActiveX properties of type VT_DISPATCH are not supported.
- Checkpoints and output values for write-only ActiveX properties are not supported.
- For database checkpoints, the format of captured values varies depending on the specific system settings. For example, date and time values may be set to different formats.
Workaround: If you are running the test or component on a different system than the one you used to record the test or component, confirm that the systems use the same format settings.
- When you create a database checkpoint on one machine and try to run it on different machine, you should have the same ODBC driver installed on both machines.
- If you perform an update run (Automation > Update Run Mode) on a test that contains checkpoints or output values for windowless ActiveX controls, and then you rerun the test, the run session may fail. This is because a hidden property called "windowless" is missing from the test object description.
Workaround: You can either relearn the problematic ActiveX controls, or you can add the "windowless" property with a value of 1 to all problematic, windowless ActiveX controls.
XML Checkpoints and Output Values
- When executing an XML checkpoint on an XML file that contains > as a value, an error message may occur.
- When you add a new value node to an XML node, in some cases the new value may not be displayed.
Workaround: Close the Edit XML as Text dialog box and reopen it to display the new value node correctly.
- When inserting an XML file checkpoint on a file that cannot be loaded, or a file that is formatted incorrectly, you may receive an error message.
- Creating and running XML checkpoints for large XML documents may take a few minutes.
Object Repository
- If you modify the name of a test object in the Object Repository while your test or component script contains a syntax error, the new name is not updated correctly within your test or component script.
Workaround: Clear the Automatically update test and component steps when you rename test objects check box (Tools > Options > General tab) and perform the renames in the script manually (recommended) or solve the syntax error, and then close and reopen the document in QuickTest to display the renamed objects in your steps.
Documentation
- All Help topics under the VBScript Reference > VBScript, VBScript Reference > Script Runtime, and VBScript Reference > Windows Script Host sections are from Microsoft. These Help files were not prepared by Mercury and Mercury is not responsible for their content. These help files were taken directly from the Microsoft Script56.chm help file, downloaded from http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/downloads/list/webdev.asp.
The information under the VBScript Reference heading may contain errors, problems, or other limitations. Mercury makes no representations whatsoever as to the accuracy, adequacy, reliability, currentness, completeness, suitability or applicability of the information under the VBScript Reference heading. Mercury is not responsible for any damages, including the loss of time, which may result from using the information in the help files under the VBScript Reference heading.
- The Previous buttons on Help topic pages may not display the expected page.
Workaround: Use the table of contents, index, or search to find the topic you need.
- When Mozilla Firefox is the default browser, the Readme files for installed patches cannot be directly viewed by clicking the relevant links from the Product Information page.
Workaround: Save the patch Readme file locally and open it with Microsoft Internet Explorer or with any text viewer.
- A newer version of the Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server Installation Guide has been released, but the updated PDF is not included in the Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server CD-ROM.
Workaround: Refer to the printed Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server Installation Guide included with your QuickTest or Mercury Functional Testing 9.1 Concurrent Package, or download the latest Mercury Functional Testing Concurrent License Server Installation Guide PDF from the Mercury Customer Support Web site.
- On some computers, links from a PDF to an external Web site (for example, http://www.adobe.com) do not work.
Workaround: Manually navigate to the required Web site.
Quality Center Integration and Business Process Testing
The Business Process Testing issues described below relate to working with business components and business process tests in QuickTest. For information on issues related to working with business components in Quality Center, refer to the Quality Center Readme.
For Business Process Testing, QuickTest Professional integrates with Quality Center version 9.0 (with a license for Business Process Testing support).
- Quality Center is not Unicode compliant. Therefore:
- When working with tests or components stored in Quality Center, you should not use Unicode values (such as the name of the test or component, the name of an application area, the default value of a test, action, or component parameter, method argument values, and so forth).
- Data that is sent to QuickTest from Quality Center (such as values for test, action, or component parameters) is not Unicode compliant.
- QuickTest results containing Unicode characters may appear corrupted in the Quality Center result grid. You can, however, open and view results containing Unicode characters in the QuickTest Test Results window.
For additional information on QuickTest Professional Unicode issues, see Multilingual Support.
- Before using the Business Component Upgrade Tool (Start > Programs > QuickTest Professional > Tools > Business Component Upgrade Tool), you must open the current installation of QuickTest at least once. Otherwise, the Business Component Upgrade Tool may not be able to open QuickTest.
- Renaming a QuickTest test or component from Quality Center may cause the test or component to behave unexpectedly.
Workaround: To rename a test or component, open it in QuickTest and rename it using the Save As option. If the test or component has already been renamed from Quality Center, use the rename option again to restore the old name, and then use the Save As option in QuickTest. Renaming a QuickTest test parameter from QuickTest will cause any run-time parameter values already set for this parameter in Quality Center to be lost.
- When working with Business Process Testing, you should not work with the same business component in Quality Center and QuickTest simultaneously on the same computer. Doing so may corrupt that business component.
- When running business process tests with a large number of iterations and business components, you may encounter memory availability problems after some time.
Workaround: Use the Restart testing tool after __ runs option in the Remote Agent Settings dialog box (Start > Programs > QuickTest Professional > Tools > Remote Agent) to count the number of business components being run and automatically restart QuickTest at the end of the first business process test iteration reached after passing the defined threshold.
- If you created a business component in QuickTest 8.2.x without an associated application area, then when you open it in QuickTest 9.0 or later and choose to convert it to the current format, any customized business component settings are cleared, and therefore the business component run will fail.
Workaround: After converting the business component, you must associate it with an application area that contains the required resources and settings.
LoadRunner and Mercury Business Process Monitor Integration
- LoadRunner run-time settings are not relevant for QuickTest GUI Vusers. Any required settings must be defined in the QuickTest test settings. When using the LoadRunner Scheduler, the number of passed iterations shown in the Vusers window of the LoadRunner Controller is inaccurate.
- QuickTest SAP GUI Vusers are not supported by LoadRunner.
- External QuickTest resources can be used either by defining them in the QuickTest test with an absolute path or by adding them as supplementary files and transferring them to Load Generator in the QuickTest test folder.
Multilingual Support
Overview
- QuickTest Professional is Unicode compliant and supports multilingual environments and applications with the following exceptions:
- Names and paths of tests, components, application areas, and resources (for example, function libraries, object repositories, and recovery scenarios) are not Unicode compliant and therefore should be specified either in English or in the language of the operating system.
- Quality Center is not Unicode compliant. For specific details, see Quality Center Integration and Business Process Testing.
Customer Support
- You can access the Customer Support Web site in Japanese at: http://www.mercury.com/jp/services/support/.
Useful Information
- You can download the Microsoft Debugger for far-eastern Windows operating systems from Microsoft's Windows Script Technologies site:
- Chinese Windows. http://www.microsoft.com/china/scripting
- Japanese Windows. http://www.microsoft.com/japan/msdn/scripting/default.asp
- Korean Windows. http://www.microsoft.com/korea/scripting
Known Problems and Limitations
Browser Support
Recording and Running Tests and Components
- QuickTest may behave unexpectedly when using multi-byte string inputs if it is installed on a VMware operating system.
Workaround: Set the hardware acceleration of the display driver to None. If this does not work, uninstall the VMware display adapter.
- Manually editing scripts in the Expert View using the Korean language on Windows XP or Windows 2003 operating systems may cause QuickTest to malfunction.
Workaround: Choose Control Panel > Regional and Language Options > Languages tab > Details > Advanced tab and select the Turn off advanced text services check box.
Note that you may need to restart your computer after setting this option.
- There may be cases during a run session when QuickTest loses the focus of the application you are testing when working in a Korean, Chinese, or Japanese operating system. This may result in a loss of data during the run session.
Workaround: Run an Activate method on the application's window to ensure focus on the window before performing the next step. For example:
Window("Notepad").Activate
- Low-level recording mode is not fully supported for multibyte character input.
- When using Chinese IME to record multiline objects:
- Running the Type method on computers with Japanese, Korean, or Chinese operating systems may not work as expected.
Workaround: Add an English input locale to the computer (using the Regional Options or Regional and Language Options in your Control Panel).
- Multibyte punctuation symbols and other multibyte special characters, such as multibyte question marks, multibyte spaces, and multibyte brackets, should not be used when naming tests, components and application areas.
Running Tests or Components in Netscape Browser
Support for Web Objects
This manual, and the accompanying software and other documentation, is protected by U.S. and international copyright laws, and may be used only in accordance with the accompanying license agreement. Features of the software, and of other products and services of Mercury Interactive Corporation, may be covered by one or more of the following patents: United States: 5,511,185; 5,657,438; 5,701,139; 5,870,559; 5,958,008; 5,974,572; 6,137,782; 6,138,157; 6,144,962; 6,205,122; 6,237,006; 6,341,310; 6,360,332, 6,449,739; 6,470,383; 6,477,483; 6,549,944; 6,560,564; 6,564,342; 6,587,969; 6,631,408; 6,631,411; 6,633,912; 6,694,288; 6,738,813; 6,738,933; 6,754,701; 6,792,460 and 6,810,494. Australia: 763468 and 762554. Other patents pending. All rights reserved.
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