OP5 Monitor - How to set up Selenium Server on Microsoft Windows

Introduction

Selenium is browser automation framework used for testing web pages and applications.
It is similar to the WebInject application included in OP5 Monitor, but includes an IDE which allows the user to build complex test cases executed by browsers like Google Chrome and Internet Explorer.

This how-to will show you how to setup Selenium Server on Microsoft Windows with Mozilla Firefox and configure test case monitoring.

Prerequisites

• Basic knowledge in Windows server administration
• The Selenium IDE installed in your web browser
• A working Internet connection for downloading dependencies
• Basic knowledge of service configuration in OP5 Monitor
• A directory called "C:\selenium" and C:\selenium\testcases"
• The "NSClient++" monitoring agent installed on the target system

Software dependencies

Selenium Server requires some additional applications and runtimes:

Mozilla Firefox -

The Firefox web browser will be used as the web driver in this how-to and can be downloaded from the Mozilla foundation's website.

Oracle Java -

Selenium Server requires the Java runtime environment, which can be downloaded from Oracle's website.

Python interpreter -

The check plugin for Selenium test cases requires the Python interpreter, version 2.X.
You can download it from the Python software foundations website.

Make sure to enable the "Add Python.exe to path" option in the installation wizard.

NSSM -

Selenium server does not include any service management out-of-the-box.
NSSM is an application which turns Windows and Java executables into system services.

You can download NSSM via their official website or via Chocolatey.

Installing Selenium Server

Download Selenium Server version 2.x from the SeleniumHQ and move the JAR-file to "C:\selenium".
Open the command prompt as administrator in extracted NSSM directory and execute the following commands to install the service: 

.\nssm.exe install selenium-server java -jar C:\selenium\selenium-server-standalone-2.45.0.jar -interactive.\nssm.exe start selenium-server 

You will also need to install the Selenium Python module for the test cases.
Open the command prompt as administrator and execute the following PIP command: 

pip.exe install selenium

Preparing the monitoring agent

Create a directory in "C:\Program Files\op5\NSClient++\scripts" called "custom" and copy the "check_selenium_win-APLHA" plugin to it.
Open a text editor as administrator and add the following lines to  "C:\Program Files\op5\NSClient++\custom.ini":

[NRPE Handlers]check_selenium=python.exe scripts\custom\check_selenium_win-ALPHA.py -s "$ARG1$" -w "$ARG2$" -c "$ARG3$" 

Restart the NSClient++ system service to reload the configuration.

Exporting Selenium IDE test cases 

Once you have created a test case, open "Export Test Case As..." in the "File" menu and select "Python 2 / unittest / WebDriver".
Save the file and copy it to the "C:\selenium\testcases" directory on your target system.

Configuring check command

Go to the "Commands" configuration page in OP5 Monitor and create a new check command with the following options:

command_name:   check_selenium_servercommand_line:   $USER1$/check_nrpe -u -H '$HOSTADDRESS$' -t 50 -c check_selenium -a '$ARG1$' '$ARG2$' '$ARG3$'

Monitoring test cases

Create a new service on your target host in OP5 Monitor and select the "check_selenium_server" command.
The check command requires three arguments:

Enter appropriate values and the save the configuration.

Once the service check has been executed, the status detail page should show something like this:

Additional information

• Official Selenium documentation (External)