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Page 5 — Comparisons

Validating your data is the key to successful testing. HighTest does this in a number of ways with it's validation functions which compare information during playback with information captured during the initial record session. The three primary validation functions are:

• CompareScreen( )
• CompareWindowInfo( )
• CompareFile( )
• CompareTextFile( )

During recording, when you select a button on the RecordBar, HighTest will capture a bitmap of the screen, the internal details of a window, or a file. During playback, the same item will be captured and compared against the data that was captured in the record session. If the playback data does not compare with the reference data, HighTest will store the playback data in its database so you may view the reference, playback and difference data to determine the source of the difference and if it is the result of a bug in your application, or an expected change in your application.

Screenshots:

When you select view screenshots, HighTest presents you with a dialog containing the screenshots stored in the database for that script. The following is an example of that window:

Modify
Edit the data stored in the database that is used to uniquely identify the portion of the screen or the window that will be captured during playback.

Swap
Replace the reference data with the playback data when the new data has been determined to be more recent and correct.

Delete
Delete the data from the database.

Find
Search for a database to open.

Mask
Place a mask on a portion of the data to force HighTest to ignore it during playback (see Page 9 in the Tour).

Select the desired record and click the Ok button and the image will be displayed in a window along with the CompareBar.

Toggling back and forth between the playback and reference images, it becomes obvious what the difference is between the two images. If you look at them close, you will see that the two images differ in the date/time stamp on the third line in the Notepad edit window.

You can also toggle to the difference screen and because these images are bitmaps, the differences that HighTest shows is where the pixels do not match. To make them easier to see, they are converted to black. This gives you the area where the images are different and you can refer to the reference and playback images to see exactly what is in the area of the differences.

Obviously, in this case, we don’t want the date and time to affect playback, so you’ll want to put a mask around that region of the screen so it will be ignored during playback. See Page 9 in the Tour for information on how to apply masks.

Window Information:

When you choose to view the Window Information, HighTest will show you a dialog similar to the one showing all the screenshot records in the database. Select one and HighTest will display a new window showing the reference and playback data side-by-side:

HighTest captures as many details of the selected window and any child windows within it. Because most controls are displayed within a window, the details of the controls can be captured as well. This method of verifying your application frees you from the display, so things such as screen resolution, color depth and version of Windows are not a factor.

You have the option to have HighTest ignore some data that may not be important to you. Click the appropriate button to have HighTest ignore the ID, Location and Order information. Some of the information will be duplicated and identical between the reference and playback datasets. Click on the Ignore Duplicates button to remove the duplicate records so you only see those records that are different.

File:

HighTest allows you to compare files in two ways: as text or as binary. When you capture a file, HighTest makes a copy of the file with the name you specify as the reference to use during playback. At playback time, HighTest compares the live file against the reference file and verifies if the files are the same or different.

When you know that the files will be different as in the case of a timestamp in a report, you may define masks for HighTest to use during the comparisons.

Masks for file compares may have a starting location, such as a line number, or a specific string of characters. Additionally, you may specify masks to exclude portions of the files. Wildcards such as '*' and '?' are supported for masking out single or multiple characters.

Selecting to view or edit the file masks brings up the following dialog:

Select one and if it is a text file, HighTest will display a dialog similar to the one below. This dialog shows you the line by line differences in the files.

If instead you chose mask in the selection dialog, HighTest will display a dialog similar to the one below:

This dialog allows you to specify the type of the compare (binary or text), the optional starting point and the masks. You may apply an unlimited number of maks to the files being compared.

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