Work Around

TestLink–Bulk Update Results

2012-02-08T04:23:00.001-08:00

For quite a while I was searching for a user allowed method of updating test results in bulk within TestLink 1.8. Our automation frameworks are not tied to TestLink. Hence the users have to manually update the test results, even if they run the test cases in automated mode.

The setting is hidden in your config.inc.php file under testlink directory. The setting is $tlCfg->exec_cfg->show_testsuite_contents.

Apparently, this setting was set to DISABLED due to possible performance impact. But you can always enable this for making life easier.

$tlCfg->exec_cfg->show_testsuite_contents = ENABLED;

And this is what you will have:

When you click on the test suite in the execute mode, you will see a similar pane (to above) on your right now. Here, you can choose the bulk result status from the above list. Once you select it, you can see that all the test cases under this group are set to the same result as the selected one.
If you want to update a different result status for only few of the test cases, you can change them manually in the drop down against that particular test case.

Something to note here:
Unfortunately, you still have to set the test results for each test suite under your test plan. That is, you need to set results at all second level folders and not for the whole test plan.

So, if your directory structuring is
    Release
        - Feature Group 1
            - Feature 1 Sub Group 1
                - Test Case 1
                - Test Case 2
                - Test Case 3
            - Feature 1 Sub Group 2
                - Test Case 4
                - Test Case 5
                - Test Case 6
            - Feature 1 Sub Group 3
                - Test Case 7
        - Feature Group 2
                - Test Case 8

You will have to set results at the level of "Feature Group X" (and luckily not at "Sub Group X", though you can also do that, if you want).

If your test suite has only one test case (as in case of Feature Group 2, in the above example), then clicking on the "Feature Group 2" opens up your Test Case 8 already.

Uploading photos to Picasa by Email

2011-07-17T12:16:00.001-07:00

For some reason the direct upload of photos from my android to Picasa was not working as intended. There was always a blank space in all photos as seen in Picasa. A quicker solution for me was to upload to Gmail / local desktop and then send it to Picasa.

It was only then that I was searching for a way to email photos directly to Picasa. Probably this is a less known feature. All you have to do is to configure your secret key in Picasa settings (Photo Settings –> General –> Upload photos by Email). Enable this setting and add your secret word and save the settings.

Now are ready to email all the photos that you want to the album of your choice in Picasa. Remember to provide the album name in the subject of your email. Else the photos will land on a temporarily created album, which leaves you with an additional job of moving them.

All that you need to remember is to keep this email address unshared. Anybody can upload photos to your Picasa albums if they come to know this address. Having said this, it automatically assures that, you can add photos from other email services (not just Gmail). It is a pity that Google does not show the upload mail address anywhere in the photo information. So, be extra cautious while you share this address.

GMail – Try new inboxes

2011-07-15T23:54:00.001-07:00

GMail now gives you options to try out different inbox appearances. A new strip on top of the inbox lets you to choose between 4 options: Classic style, Important first, Unread first, Starred first, Priority Inbox.

The classic style gives the old school way of first-come mail first in your inbox. The important first splits inbox into two with important mails first. The same way for unread first and starred first with unread mails and starred mails appearing in the top part of the inbox. The priority inbox, in case if you are using it (however, I don’t see a difference between Important first and Priority Inbox).

I’m not sure if this is rolled out to everybody. I didn’t have to enable anything in the labs to set this.

Test Data Generator

2011-05-17T04:52:00.001-07:00

As a tester, I had always been through this boring phase of generating data for my tests. In most of the scenarios, I end up writing SQL scripts for inserting data into the table.

Recently, I came across this test data generator for generating dummy data for all your works. It’s a pretty simple online tool that generates data based on your table structure. All you have to do is to key in some table information (column title, type of data, examples etc) and hit on Generate.

It supports both download (Excel, XML, CSV formats) or simply get SQL statements (MySQL, Oracle). You can download a webapp (MySQL + PHP) that you can use offline by hosting it on your web server. If you are looking in for a quick solution for generating data, then this is one.

Google searches your Reader subscriptions

2011-05-14T09:49:00.001-07:00

Yet another interesting news to Google Reader users. Your Google search is including results from your reader subscriptions. If the search results include any of your subscriptions, then a small note "From your Google Reader subscriptions" is attached to it.

I'm already happy with the search within the Reader. But from time to time, I forget where I read a piece of information, whether in the Reader or anywhere else. This is pretty helpful in that regards.

My take: It could be more useful if we can "star" or "tag" the feed from the same search results page. Else we are left to make a second search on Google Reader.

How to install Android Apps on your phone offline

2011-05-14T09:46:00.001-07:00

Have you ever been in a situation where you find some nice apps for your android, but can’t install it immediately because you don’t have wifi / 3g on your phone at that moment? I ran in to this situation often. I have a very bad 3g plan and no wifi at work.

Android market allows you to select the apps, games that you are interested and install them on your phone later when it gets a wifi / 3g connection. Simply follow these steps:

> Login with your Google account to https://market.android.com.
> Search and browse to your favorite app or game.
> Click on Install (or Install after you pay for it, in case of paid app).
> Choose your phone from the drop down list*.
> Simply finish by clicking INSTALL.

As soon as you get home you will see that the app had been downloaded and installed.

* In order to have your phone listed here make sure that you use your Google account in your phone. All the information about your phone are then stored with your account settings.

Play Angry Birds from Anywhere

2011-05-12T00:48:00.000-07:00

No wonder Rovio’s Angry Birds is one of the best mobile games in the market. When I first came to know about it, I remember that I spent all my android battery on it every evening. Even the word "addictive" does not describe the game's popularity correctly. Especially with their seasonal updates and new games, you are never bored like playing any other regular ones.

And whats next? Your favorite mobile game now comes to the browsers. No more downloads for playing the game.
Point your browser to http://chrome.angrybirds.com/ and just start enjoying.

Find out when your Android will be updated

2011-05-11T04:11:00.000-07:00

Android releases are always known for their delays. Having Gingerbread being introduced to HTC Desire HD and Incredible S, our next questions are for the other models. If you like me, looking out for the update news, check our this document. It lists all the Android driven mobiles with their likely date of Gingerbread update.

Just hit Ctrl+F and search for your model.

Moving your wordpress blog to another domain

2010-08-19T05:22:00.000-07:00

This is a quick sum up of steps-to-do for moving / copying your wordpress blog/site from one domain to another.
When there is always a possibility to do it more properly or elaborately, what I'm going to brush up here is a quick method of doing it.

1. Start copying your theme files to your destination host. (Let me tell you… this is the only lengthy process of the whole move). Do the following in the meantime.

2. Take a backup of your wordpress database. You can either use phpMyAdmin or backup utility from your hosting service or a direct mysqldump to do this.

             -> phpMyAdmin: Can be launched from the control panel of your hosting site.
             -> Backup utility: Can also be run from the control panel of your hosting site.
             -> mysqldump: Here is the command to do that from the command line (make sure that you are pointing to the correct MySql server while running this)
                         > mysqldump -u <username> -p <database_name> --result-file=<dumpfile_path_and_name>
        This command would ask for your password.

3. Create a new empty database on your destination host.

4. Run the backup. Again, this could be done via either of the three options told before.

5. You would need to update two values on your wordpress options table. Though you can use a direct SQL, I would suggest phpMyAdmin for this. Login to the phpMyAdmin screen.
Search for a table called Options in the list of all tables. Edit the following two values:
> option_id=1 (siteurl) & option_id=39 (homeurl): You would observe that both of these contain the URL of your previous domain. Change them to the new one.

And that’s all about it!. Your blog/website is ready to be launched.

TestLink - Yet another solution to login.php?note=expired

2010-08-04T04:11:00.000-07:00

This is a quick post on TestLink. For people who don't know what is Testlink, it is an open source test management tool. For more details take a look here.

Now getting back on track, for past couple of days, we had been trying to setup TestLink on IIS/MSSQL. Had got it working before with Apache/MySQL. But we were planning to use it in our company. So I had to try it on IIS/MSSQL - Company recommendations. :)

Well, it all went quite fast. The installation was OK. Was able to create a user using firstLogin.php file. Verified that the user is indeed created correctly in the database. But launching <host>/testlink/index.php didn't take me anywhere. It redirected me to login.php?note=expired. Everything looked good and the worst part was, the same code was working with my Apache/MySQL setup.

Didn't have much help with their forums, either. They were all pointing to session related issues. But I was not convinced.

After a lot of debug statements on the code I found the problem.

In testlink\lib\functions\plan.core.inc.php file, at function getTestPlansWithoutProject(), the SQL query had a column name in CAPS! Changing it to lower case fixed a 4-days-problem.

So, instead of
$sql = "select id,name from nodes_hierarchy WHERE id IN(SELECT id FROM testplans
WHERE testproject_id=0 and ACTIVE=1)";

it should be
$sql = "select id,name from nodes_hierarchy WHERE id IN(SELECT id FROM testplans
WHERE testproject_id=0 and active=1)";

It was so strange that there was no catch for this. And the error, expired page, doesn't tell us anything related to the actual problem. We also left the solution at TestLink forums.

I’m running IIS7 with MSSQL 2008 (/2005) and TestLink version 1.8.5.

If you ever have the same problem, please try this solution out and let us know your feedback. Thanks.

Tal.ki – A Free Forum For Your Website

2010-06-03T07:02:00.000-07:00

Planning to make a forum on your site? Tal.ki is a free forum application that installs an user forum on your website. It is also a one-minute-setup. All you have to do is to grab the piece of code from here and copy it to wherever you want within your site. And you are ready to go!
Unlike most of the other sites / free stuffs, this Tal.ki doesn’t require you to signup for any free accounts. The users are not required to create any account on your site. They could login using their own accounts on Google, Yahoo!, MySpace, OpenID etc. (there is a whole big list out there!). And so, there is no more account creation, and dedicated set of users on your site. You don’t have to maintain any user information in your databases or provide with sessions. Tal.ki does everything for you. But one must keep in mind that all the forums are public. Member-only forums are available with a paid-version of Tal.ki.
The forum administrator can also control the default login for the forum. All that has to be done is, just, to choose which login button appears :).

The forum itself lets you to add quick posts with support for photos (over web), quoted text, embedding (YouTube videos etc), sharing via twitter, e-mail (and all), custom signatures etc.

The free version of Tal.ki comes with - Unlimited Postings
- Unlimited Members
- 5 forums (all public)
- API access
- 15 recent topics
Three categories of priced versions have various other features. But if you are hosting a personal or small scale website and if you really don’t care about forums being public, then the free version is what is best suited to you. You can see a demo site with Tal.ki embedded here or here.

Whatz more? They also expose a plugin for Wordpress and Google Sites. Do let us know your feedback about Tal.ki!

Bookmarks Sync with Google

2010-05-26T05:10:00.001-07:00

I’m not sure how many of us had noticed… Xmarks for Google Chrome browser is not working anymore. Recently, I’m facing problems with synchronizing my bookmarks/passwords across my browsers and laptops.
What is Xmarks?
A little introduction about Xmarks, for people who don’t know much about it. Xmarks is an efficient add-on that support synchronizing your bookmarks, passwords etc across different browsers and across all of your work stations. Currently they support Google Chrome, Firefox & IE. My primary browser is Google Chrome. I was one of those happy buddies when they introduced it for Chrome. You can create multiple profiles (work, home, personal etc) and organize your bookmarks in them. This was quite a powerful add-on for Firefox (I don't know how it is for IE, as I'm not using it there).

As I said before, recently the service is not working anymore for Chrome. There are server synchronization errors. For people who face this, Google Bookmarks could be an alternate. While in Firefox, you need a add-on to use this, in Chrome it's not the case. You can use the "Sync" feature for synchronizing your bookmarks to your Google Account (which then is replicated to other browsers). And it is just not bookmarks. You can also add your theme to it. Though, not very useful for other browsers, but for people working primarily on Chrome, it provides the same environment & mood everywhere!

How to setup?

1. Choose "Setup Sync" from Customization menu on your chrome.
2. Sign in to your account. And that's all you have to do.

The synchronization of bookmarks happen until you are logged in to your account on the browser. Once you log-out the synchronization stops. But nothing is deleted from your Google account itself. Only the changes that you make (to bookmarks etc) will not get to your account.

What are the added advantages of using "Google"?

1. No data is lost anywhere. Everything is in your Google account.
2. You don't have to sign in to, yet another service for synchronizing bookmarks.
3. Create lists & share your bookmarks with others.
4. Fully searchable.

All those are OK.. but where are these stored in Google? Don’t rush to www.google.com/bookmarks. They are stored in your Google Docs now. You can find them under “Google Chrome” directory.

My Take: I do see that I cannot launch Bookmarks from within the Google Docs. May be it's intended. But strange!! :)

Shashin for Picasa & Wordpress

2010-05-04T23:24:00.001-07:00

Not long ago, I was searching for a wordpress plug-in to get photos from Picasa to my site. It is a site that I’m making for my husband’s cricket team. My aim was to keep it simple, clean and easy to get running. Basically, I was looking for a Wordpress + Picasa + Lightbox solution. After quite some search, I landed with Shashin.

Shashin is a free wordpress plug-in for integrating Picasa photos into your site. And what I like more about, this is the ability to work with Picasa feeds instead of storing content locally. What it does store locally is the meta data and other information about the albums (it creates a couple of tables on your wordpress database to store them). Shashin is smart enough to update itself of the changes in the Picasa albums and other data.

Below is a quick list of it’s features.

Photos and Videos
High range of options on sorting, display, filtering etc. Simple and easy to use interface to configure all these.

Support to include Google Maps for the location information.
Good documentation for developers.
Automatic synchronization with Picasa.

Here are some good examples. Shashin works with Highslide for displaying the images and videos (they say that it also works with other jQuery libraries like Lightbox). (Note: Highslide charges you for commercial use. Whereas Shashin itself is free for all use).
I was able to get it running in matter of minutes! Most of the other plug-ins, that I came across, either had to with storing photos on the server which, in my opinion, is a burden., especially if you keep migrating and editing your photos. Or some of them had a poor documentation or maintenance of the plug-in. Or they required a Geek's knowledge to set that all up! :D
But this one is fairly simple. Their tag idea was petty good. All that you have to do is to insert the necessary tag (single image photo or album etc), wherever you want in the post (or a page). Remember that working with Lightbox or iBox required you edit the <img> tag to say a rel="lightbox".
Give it a try and let us know.

Switch WordPress themes programmatically

2010-04-27T23:41:00.001-07:00

The current WordPress theme name is saved in the wp_options table of your WordPress database. The easy way to do it is to use the update_option() function, as shown in the function below. Paste it in your functions.php file.

function updateTheme($theme){
update_option('template', $theme);
update_option('stylesheet', $theme);
update_option('current_theme', $theme);
}

Call to the function can be made the following way: <php updateTheme('default'); ?>
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