How to Automate Testing Contact Forms Across Multiple Websites?

JasonSc

JasonSc

BuSo Pro
Joined
Mar 30, 2016
Messages
109
Likes
144
Degree
1
I'm looking for away to automate testing contact forms across multiple websites. It seems like every 2 weeks a client calls saying their contact form isn't working.
These are really simply forms based on Contact Form 7, with 3-4 entry fields.

The ideal solution would to have an application run on a given day and test all of our sites contact forms.

I have looked into to some testing software, but its way to robust for my needs.

Any suggestions on a simple software with a scheduling feature?
 
JasonSc said:
I'm looking for away to automate testing contact forms across multiple websites.

Any suggestions on a simple software with a scheduling feature?
Click to expand...

In terms of simple, what you'd probably want is either:
  • Some form of workflow automation SAAS app.
  • Browser automation extension, add-on, or macro.
Although I can't think of a specific example for your use case, there may be a recipe with Zapier that can accomplish it. Not too sure about that one unfortunately. There are plenty of other SAAS options, and some more specific to this use case, though most I've seen seem to start at $50+/mth, if that's an issue for you?

As far as browser automation add-ons, here's a few for Chrome:
And for Firefox:
I don't use any of those myself, so I'm not sure if they'll do what you need.

As far as more robust solutions, one you'll hear about most is Selenium, which is used for lots of browser automation at more of a programmatic level. Selenium IDE is the more relevant version, which is desktop-based and also has Firefox and Chrome plugins. This is definitely getting more heavy into the code side of things, which it sounds like you don't want. Just thought I'd preemptively mention it, since it ALWAYS comes up on this subject. :wink:

One other desktop-based app I came across is Katalon Studio. It actually looks incredibly nice, professional, and robust. Best part is it's FREE!

With any of these code-oriented options, obviously there's going to be more setup involved, which may be a deal breaker. Still, it's worth considering, as those types of options tend to be a bit more trustworthy in the long term, versus relying on some dude's random browser plugin that may fail at any given time.
 
turbin3 said:
There are plenty of other SAAS options, and some more specific to this use case, though most I've seen seem to start at $50+/mth, if that's an issue for you?
Click to expand...
Under a $100 a month is not an issue. The solutions I was finding where $200+ a month or a one time fee of $1K+.

turbin3 said:
One other desktop-based app I came across is Katalon Studio. It actually looks incredibly nice, professional, and robust. Best part is it's FREE!
Click to expand...
I'm going to take this for a test drive. It looks very promising. Thank you for your help!
 
Could you use Mturk for this activity?
 
Sounds like an easy bot to write up. Python, Python Requests, and some Regex. If they're using the same contact form plugin or the same roll-your-own, you can likely get it done with one chunk of code iterating through an array that includes the URLs to the contact pages. Requests & being able to grab Regex right out of the developer console of your browser should make this a walk in the park.

Some Google searches show people doing similar tasks, like logging into a set of websites with a username, email address, and password, in as little as 15 lines of code and less, using Python & Requests. Since it's a form on the page you can probably just grab the HTML "value=" attribute to tell it which input to use for each piece of text, and skip Regex altogether.
 
@turbin3 Thank you!
Just a quick update. Katalon Studio did the trick. For a nonprogrammer such as myself, it was rather easy to get setup and running. It took about an hour to get a functioning script together.

Katalon does not have a scheduler, but it has a built in feature which will make batch files, so you can just use Task Manager to schedule to run a batch file.

I'm not a developer, but this program looks like it could be really hand for simple repeatable tasks.
 
Awesome! Glad to hear it. It certainly looked to be well-developed. Glad to hear the barrier to entry wasn't too high either.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back