Transition Request: WebDriver to Proposed Recommendation

This is a request from the Browser Testing and Tools Working Group to
transition the WebDriver spec to Proposed Recommendation.

# Title: WebDriver
# URL: https://w3c.github.io/webdriver/webdriver-spec.html
# Estimated publication date: 31 September 2017

# Abstract
WebDriver is a remote control interface that enables introspection and control of user agents. It provides a platform- and language-neutral wire protocol as a way for out-of-process programs to remotely instruct the behavior of web browsers.
Provided is a set of interfaces to discover and manipulate DOM elements in web documents and to control the behavior of a user agent. It is primarily intended to allow web authors to write tests that automate a user agent from a separate controlling process, but may also be used in such a way as to allow in-browser scripts to control a — possibly separate — browser.
The standard forms part of the Web Testing Activity that authors a larger set of tools commonly used for testing.

# Status
https://w3c.github.io/webdriver/webdriver-spec.html#status-of-this-document

# Link to group's decision to request transition
https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-browser-tools-testing/2017JulSep/0006.html

# Requirements satisfied
Only clarifications have been made on areas under specified.

The primary requirement for this document is to document the WebDriver wire
protocol and Actions API, as well as its standard Capabilities, Sessions model,
and navigation behavior, along with details such as command contexts, and
element interaction, as currently supported in multiple implementations.

The success of the specification in meeting its requirement is attested to
by existing widespread usage of WebDriver.

# Dependencies met (or not)
There are no dependencies which have not been satisfied.

The spec has normative dependencies on the following W3C Recs:

* Cascading Style Sheets Level 2 Revision 1 (CSS 2.1) (Rec)
* Page Visibility (Second Edition) (Rec)
* Pointer Events (Rec)
* Namespaces in XML 1.0 (Third Edition) (Rec)
* XML Path Language (XPath) Version 1.0 (Rec)

The spec has normative dependencies on the following W3C CRs:

* CSS Cascading and Inheritance Level 4 (CR)
* CSS Values and Units Module Level 3 (CR)
* Geometry Interfaces Module Level 1 (CR)

The spec has normative dependencies on the following W3C working drafts:

* Content Security Policy Level 3 (WD)
* CSS Device Adaptation Module Level 1 (WD)
* CSS basic box model (WD)
* CSS Display Module Level 3 (WD)
* CSS Object Model (CSSOM) (WD)
* CSSOM View Module (WD)
* DOM Parsing and Serialization (WD)
* HTML Editing APIs (WD)
* UI Events (WD)
* UI Events KeyboardEvent code Values (WD)
* UI Events KeyboardEvent key Values (WD)
* Web IDL (WD)

The spec has normative dependencies on the following WHATWG Living Standards:

* HTML (LS)
* DOM (LS)
* Fetch (LS)
* URL (LS)
* Fullscreen API (LS)
* Infra (LS)

The Browser Testing and Tools Working Group Working Group has responded to all
review feedback submitted by other groups, and all other groups remain satisfied
with the resolutions they have received for their comments.

# Wide Review
Evidence that the specification has received wide review is provided by the
record of discussions in the specification’s issue tracker:

https://github.com/w3c/webdriver/issues

# Issues addressed
The specification’s issue tracker contains a total of 296 resolved issues.

# Formal Objections
None

-- 
Michael[tm] Smith https://people.w3.org/mike