Problems with WPF app

Technology specific object identification, supported applications, web technologies, and 3rd party controls.
Chaoswork
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Joined: Fri Apr 06, 2012 1:39 pm

Problems with WPF app

Post by Chaoswork » Fri Apr 06, 2012 3:15 pm

We are making R&D on Ranorex, whether it can help us autoamting our application.
The app itself using Infragistics NetAdvantage Contorls and WPF Toolkit there's a great issue.
We have DoubleUpDown control from WPF Toolkit which is defined as a whole stack and all the properties regarding it, but Ranorex Spy pulls out a TextBox and Increase\Decrease Buttons, but puts them not in a sort of container, but into a form of a grid. This items TextBox and Increase\Decrease Buttons cannot be defined by us and this becomes a real problem, because we don't want to be bound to indices, cause the application is under development and thus may change.
P.S. we tried to put this control inside any other as grid or DockPanel in order at least to have the way to it, but nothing helped.

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Re: Problems with WPF app

Post by Support Team » Tue Apr 10, 2012 9:35 am

Hi,

can you please provide us a snapshot of your application under test holding the mentioned control.
Follwoing chapter of our user guide will explain how to generate a snapshot file:
Creating Ranorex Snapshot Files.

You can either attach the file to your net forum post, or you can sned it to our support mail box (support(at)ranorex.com).


Regards,
Tobias
Ranorex Team

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Re: Problems with WPF app

Post by Support Team » Tue Apr 10, 2012 2:07 pm

Hi,

thank you for providing the snapshot file.
To overcome this issue, it is advisable to set the Automation Id of your controls, to make them identifiable uniquely.

Regards,
Tobias
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Chaoswork
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Re: Problems with WPF app

Post by Chaoswork » Tue Apr 10, 2012 2:26 pm

The thing is that those controls are in a sort of a parent element, but Ranorex doesn't see it, this parent level, it is only seeing its derivatives which is TextBox and increase/decrease buttons. And automation id is inherited from this parent element. We don't want to decompile this control, althogh it is an open-source toolkit, but decomiling and changing it for our needs from source menas that we will be obliged to update/upgrade always manualy and this is not a great idea for us and gonn become a pin in you-know-yourself-what. Why don't you make Ranorex being able to see this parent elements and the problem will be solved without changing the app sources?

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Re: Problems with WPF app

Post by Support Team » Wed Apr 11, 2012 12:13 pm

Hi,
Why don't you make Ranorex being able to see this parent elements and the problem will be solved without changing the app sources?
Because it seems that the UIAutomation implementation is not correct so we cannot identify that element because the identification of WPF elements is based on UIAutomation.
To make sure that this is not a Ranorex bug you can check with the Microsoft UISpy if this tool is able to identify the elements correctly, if not there is no other way than to re-implement UIAutomation.

Regards,
Markus
Ranorex Support Team

Chaoswork
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Re: Problems with WPF app

Post by Chaoswork » Thu Apr 12, 2012 7:31 am

Hi,
Thanks for reply.
I'm researching on what we can do it terms of re-implementing UIAutomation.
As soon as I will get some results I will write back here.
Thanks for your assistance.