Robot Framework 5
Intro
You can learn a lot of useful information about the previous version and Robot Framework itself in our article: Robot Framework 4 — Tesena.
In this article, we will focus on new features in the last major release of Robot Framework 5.0.
Robot Framework is a popular tool for a large number of projects Teseners are working on. Upgrading to the new version of this tool can be very useful because of the new features and functionality it brings.
First look
New features were implemented according to a community survey previously created by developers. Let’s see what was introduced to us in this release.
TRY/EXCEPT
Robot Framework 5.0 adds native TRY/EXCEPT syntax, which is the same as Python's exception handling syntax, making handling errors that arise during execution much more convenient than it was previously. The TRY, EXCEPT, ELSE, and FINALLY branches are identical to those in Python, and they function mainly in the same way. One distinction is that while Robot Framework requires all this type of syntax to use upper case letters, Python uses lower case try, except, etc.
*** Test Cases ***
First example
TRY
Some Keyword
EXCEPT Error message
Error Handler Keyword
END
Keyword Outside
More useful examples can be found here.
WHILE
The new WHILE loops in Robot Framework was one of the most needed features in community for long time. It functions mainly in the same way as similar loops in other languages. Basically, the loop runs until either the loop condition is satisfied, the loop is explicitly terminated using BREAK or RETURN, or one of the loop's keywords fails.
*** Variables ***
${x} 10
*** Test Cases ***
Loop as long as condition is True
WHILE ${x} > 0
Log ${x}
${x} = Evaluate ${x} - 1
END
More useful examples can be found here.
Inline IF
Simplification of usage of basic IF/ELSE structure for straightforward situations.
*** Keyword ***
Normal IF
IF $condition1
Keyword argument
END
IF $condition2
RETURN
END
Inline IF
IF $condition1 Keyword argument
IF $condition2 RETURN
BREAK and CONTINUE
*** Test Cases ***
Example
FOR ${x} IN RANGE 1000
IF ${x} > 10 BREAK
Log Executed only when ${x} < 11
IF ${x} % 2 == 0 CONTINUE
Log Executed only when ${x} is odd.
END
RETURN
A universal way to return user keywords has been added by the new RETURN statement. It can be used to return values after the keyword has been executed, as with the old [Return] setting, as well as to return before the keyword has been executed, as supported by the old Return From Keyword keyword
*** Keywords ***
Return at the end
Some Keyword
${result} = Another Keyword
RETURN ${result}
Return conditionally
IF ${condition}
RETURN Something
ELSE
RETURN Something else
END
Early return
IF ${not applicable} RETURN
Some Keyword
Another Keyword
Another important change: Python 2 is not supported anymore. Robot Framework 5.0 requires Python 3.6 or newer. Unfortunately, this also means that Jython and IronPython are not supported anymore because they do not have Python 3 compatible releases available. If you are using Python 2, Jython, or IronPython, you can continue using Robot Framework 4 series.
Also, there are a lot of other changes and improvements you can read about here
Autor: Dmytro Borysov
Dmytro has almost five years of experience in the testing field. The last two and half years, he is mainly focused on automation testing. He is specialised in programming tests in Python and Robot framework and is also familiar in using Postman for manual API testing.