Question

I am testing a web application where certain text fields have restrictions based on requirements (eg.Amount textfield disallows alphabets and special characters & Name textfield disallows Numeric and special characters.), So while trying manually in a browser the restrictions work fine. But while automating the same testcase such textfields accept all data(eg. alphabets(lowercase and upper case),digits,special characters.)…Means in automation no restricton works at all..I am writing automated tests using Selenium in Eclipse(testNG framework) and using SeleniumRC to run tests.

Answer 1

I would suggest to use RegExps for verifying strings format.
e.g. my veryfying of build version format

@Test
    public void buildVersionFormatVerify() throws IOException {

    String buildVersion = findElementByCssSelector("home.buildversion.label").getText().trim();
    String extractedVer;
    extractedVer = buildVersion.substring(buildVersion.indexOf(':')+1,buildVersion.length()).trim();

    Assert.assertTrue("build version does not match regexp",extractedVer.matches("\\d.\\d\\s.\\s\\d{2}"));

}

another approach can be the following:
you enter a certain string which does not satisfy input format accordingly to functional spec. Then you can trigger somhow that input was accepted (no error messages appears or validator has not handled inproper input) and you can block the ‘accepted input’ not following to functional spec with assert
e.g.

 Assert.assertFalse("improper input format",isElementPresent(By.xpath(...xpath of the error message...)));

IMHO, it is my vision of solution to this issue.