robotframework For Linux

robotframework (also known as Robot Framework) is an open source, modular, free and platform-independent command-line software project implemented in Python and designed from the offset to deliver a keyword-driven test automation framework to all mainstream operating systems.

It is mostly used for acceptance level testing, but it can also be used for ATDD (Acceptance Test-driven Development). It features an easy-to-use tabular syntax for generating test cases and works under Linux, Windows and Mac operating systems.

Developers can use test libraries to extend the testing capabilities of robotframework, implemented either with Java or Python programming languages. New keywords can also be created from existing ones, using the same simple syntax.

Despite that fact that Robot Framework is written in Python, it can also run on IronPython (.NET) and Jython (JVM). It boasts a featureful ecosystem that comprises of several generic utilities and test libraries, which are currently maintained as separate software projects.

To install and use the Robot Framework software on your GNU/Linux computer, it is recommended to use the pip (python-pip) tool (e.g. sudo pip install robotframework). However, you can also install it using the source tarball distributed for free on Softpedia.

Simply download the archive, save it on your computer, unpack it, open a terminal emulator, move to the location of the extracted archive files with the ‘cd’ command (e.g. cd /home/softpedia/robotframework-2.8.6) and run the ‘sudo python setup.py install’ command.

After installation, you can interact with the framework by running either of the pybot, ipybot or jybot scripts. Detailed usage instructions, installation instructions, as well as real life examples can be found on the GitHub page of the project (see the homepage link below for details).