HtmlUnit

HtmlUnit

Initial release	May 22, 2002 (2002-05-22)
Stable release	4.4.0 / July 28, 2024;7 months ago (2024-07-28)
Repository	github.com/HtmlUnit/htmlunit
Written in	Java
Operating system	Cross-platform (JVM)
Available in	English
Type	Web browser
License	Apache License 2.0
Website	https://htmlunit.sourceforge.io/

HtmlUnit is a headless web browser written in Java. It allows high-level manipulation of websites from other Java code, including filling and submitting forms and clicking hyperlinks. It also provides access to the structure and the details within received web pages. HtmlUnit emulates parts of browser behaviour including the lower-level aspects of TCP/IP and HTTP. A sequence such as getPage(url), getLinkWith("Click here"), click() allows a user to navigate through hypertext and obtain web pages that include HTML, JavaScript, Ajax and cookies. This headless browser can deal with HTTPS security, basic HTTP authentication, automatic page redirection and other HTTP headers. It allows Java test code to examine returned pages either as text, an XML DOM, or as collections of forms, tables, and links. ^[1]

The goal is to simulate real browsers; namely Chrome, Firefox and Edge.

The most common use of HtmlUnit is test automation of web pages, but sometimes it can be used for web scraping, or downloading website content.

Benefits

• Provides high-level API, taking away lower-level details away from the user. ^[2]
• Compared to other WebDriver implementations, HtmlUnitDriver is the fastest to implement. ^[3]
• It can be configured to simulate a specific browser.

Drawbacks

• Element layout and rendering can not be tested. ^[4]
• The JavaScript support is not complete, which is one of the areas of ongoing enhancements.

Used technologies

• W3C DOM
• HTTP connection, using Apache HttpComponents
• JavaScript, using forked Rhino
• HTML Parsing, NekoHTML
• CSS: using CSS Parser
• XPath support, using Xalan

Libraries using HtmlUnit

• Selenium WebDriver
• Spring MVC Test Framework
• Google Web Toolkit tests
• WebTest
• Wetator

See also

• Free and open-source software portal

• Headless system
• Web scraping
• Web testing
• xUnit

References

1. "HtmlUnit Home". Sourceforge. Retrieved 30 August 2019.
2. Beust, Cédric; Suleiman, Hani (15 October 2007). Next Generation Java Testing: TestNG and Advanced Concepts. Pearson Education. ISBN   9780132702270 . Retrieved 30 August 2019.
3. "HtmlUnit Driver". Github. Retrieved 30 August 2019.
4. "Testing HTML Unit". GWT Project. Retrieved 30 August 2019.

Bibliography

• Beust, Cédric; Suleiman, Hani (15 October 2007). Next Generation Java Testing: TestNG and Advanced Concepts. Pearson Education. ISBN   9780132702270. pp. 339– (subscription required)

Further reading

• Langer, A. "Extending HtmlUnit for test automatisation of Web applications using AJAX"; Betreuer/in (nen): T. Grechenig, M. Bernhart; 183/1, 2009. (subscription required)
• Massol, Vincent; Timothy M. O'Brien (2005). Maven: A Developer's Notebook. O'Reilly Media. pp.  83–86. ISBN   978-0-596-55297-8.
• Tahchiev, Petar; Felipe Leme; Vincent Massol (2010). "12. Presentation Layer Testing". JUnit in Action (2 ed.). Manning. pp. 190–208. ISBN   978-1-935182-02-3.
• Harold, Elliotte Rusty (16 March 2012). Refactoring HTML. Addison-Wesley Professional. ISBN   9780132701877.
• Tong, Ka Iok (23 April 2006). Enjoying Web Development with Tapestry. TipTec Development. ISBN   9781411649132.
• Schalk, Chris; Burns, Ed; Holmes, James (25 August 2006). JavaServer Faces: The Complete Reference. McGraw Hill Professional. ISBN   9780072262407.(subscription required)

External links

• HtmlUnit
• Data Crawling and Scraping Platform