Introduction

CLI tool for generating Cucumber Specs to run in a web browser

Installation

npm  install -g cucumberjs-browser

Why?

There are a few examples out in the wild that demonstrate how to write CucumberJS specs in the browser and/or for the browser:

• HTML example from CucumberJS
• cukecipes
• karma-cucumberjs

Good libraries and examples, but I wanted to be able to write my feature specs, support and step definitions as I normally would that are run under the CucumberJS CLI for node, and have them simply execute in the browser without having to modify them to fit another runtime or environment.

Additionally, I wanted to be able to define custom listeners that will provide feedback from your run specs dependent on my development needs and CI endpoint.

Further Reading

A few articles have been written with further details on incorporating into your project and test automation routines:

• BDD in Javascript: CucumberJS and The Browser
• BDD in Javascript: CucumberJS and The Browser II

Note:

As of February 15th, 2014, there is only the following listeners that can be assigned:

• TAP (using the node-tap module)
• UI (basic example of printing specs to DOM)
• SAUCELABS (uses QUnit reporting model to hook into saucelabs reporter)
• TESTEM (patches Testem.emit to emulate like qunit adapter)

More to come...

How?

The cucumberjs-browser cli tool bundles feature specs, support files and step definitions into standalone browserify-ied modules.

These references are injected into a testrunner template which instantiated a new CucumberJS runtime when the testrunner is loaded in a browser. When a format listener is defined, the page and/or console are updated as specs are run.

All this is donw without having to change the way you write your specs as you normally do!

Usage

cucumberjs-browser [-o outdir] [-f format] [--tmpl template] [--features features]

outdir

The directory to generate the web-based cucumber task-runner.

Default: /browser-cukes

template

The default template to use in generating the main task-runner page. Most likely you will want to provide your own custom template that also loads your projects libraries and stylesheets. There is a default template that should be used as an example of what is required to properly run the specs in a browser.

Default: /template/cucumber-testrunner.template

features

The directory path for the Cucumber feature specs.

This location is used in globbing and bundling support and step files from the following locations under the directory:

• /support/**/*.js
• /step_definitions/**/*.js

Default: /features

format

The format to provide in the browser.

Formats are delivered by assigning a listener to the CucumberJS runtime in the browser. Currently, these listeners are internally to this library and are bundled and deployed to the specified output directory. In the future I would like to open up the possibility of assigning custom formatters/listeners.

Possible values (as of February 15th, 2014):

• ui
• tap
• saucelabs
• testem

Default: none

License

Copyright (c) 2014 Todd Anderson

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.