Re: jsUnit 1.3.0 alpha and Mac testing

Mary Brady wrote:
> Does this version handle loading xml, xhtml, and html
> documents?  The problem we were having here at NIST
> for both the html and hc_compatible tests is the need
> to load xhtml and html files in a consistent manner.  The
> files are not consistently finished loading before the tests
> are run.
>  
> --Mary
>  

Mary,

You can download the alpha version at 
http://bclary.com/jsunit/jsunit-1.3.0-alpha.zip and modify either the 
example test which loads the data.html or the one which loads the 
staff.xml documents to see if the types of test files you are interested 
in are loaded consistently.

The current alpha uses IFRAMEs with an onload handler specified via 
attribute and appears to load documents consistently in IE 5.5+ on 
Windows and in Mozilla on Windows, Mac and Linux.

Mozilla currently has a bug where IFRAMEs containing documents specified 
by file:// URLs do not fire onload handlers but Mozilla does appear to 
fire the necessary onload handlers when using http:// based IFRAMEs and 
documents. Mozilla developers are aware of this problem and I hope to 
convince them to include a fix for this in Mozilla 1.0.

Here is a summary of the current testing of jsUnit on other browsers:

I have two different reports from IE5/Macintosh testers:

1) that IE 5+/Mac can run the alpha jsUnit but that it does not load the 
documents into IFRAMEs but does appear to be able to load documents into 
FRAMEs.

2) that IE5+/Mac can not run the alpha jsUnit at all.

I need to do more work to determine the best way to support IE 5+ on 
Macintosh if that is possible. Advice on the best way to support IE5/mac 
would certainly be appreciated.

There is a problem in IE5.5+ on Windows where raw XML documents are 
converted into DHTML when loaded into the browser rather than via the 
MSXML ActiveX control. I hope that there is a switch that can turn this 
feature off but I am not sure of that. I do not know if IE5.5+ does the 
same type of conversion to DHTML for XHTML documents but it is easily 
tested.

Dimitris pointed out that the report of the number of tests that were 
run in a test page is currently being reported inconsistently by 
Mozilla. I have not determined the reason for that as of yet.

Navigator 4.x will not run the tests since it does not support try/catch 
from ECMAScript 262-3rd.

Konqueror does not run jsUnit at all and has serious problems in 
handling modal dialogs. It may not be possible to support Konqueror in 
it's current state. I have contacted several Konqueror developers and am 
hoping to hear from them soon.

Opera 5/6 do not run jsUnit due to problems in modifying the contents of 
FRAMEs and IFRAMEs. Opera's support of ECMAScript and the DOM 0 does not 
appear to be adequate to support jsUnit at this time.

As you can see, additional help in testing jsUnit in multiple browsers 
would be very helpful. Advice from people familiar with these browsers 
would also be very helpful.

I would like to support as many browsers as possible however I can only 
do so much to work around specific browser shortcomings. I believe that 
coding jsUnit to use reasonable basic techniques from HTML, DOM 0 and 
ECMAScript and providing third party browser developers a goal to 
improve their support sufficiently to support jsUnit may be the best 
approach for supporting alternative browsers (other than IE5/Windows and 
Mozilla) in the future without having to include browser specific work 
arounds in jsUnit or the DOM TS itself.

I am considering approaches which would allow a choice of configuring 
the test cases as proposed by Curt earlier but have not reached a 
decision on how to go about it as of yet.

I would like to determine the acceptable method for loading external 
data documents into tests as soon as possible so that work can proceed 
on how to incorporate the  new jsUnit into the DOM TS and if any 
modifications to the current alpha would be necessary in order to use it 
in the DOM TS. Any and all help will be appreciated.

Bob

Received on Wednesday, 24 April 2002 10:23:44 UTC