Selenium series: The Page Object Model design pattern

Matthew Casperson's blog post discusses the limitations of sequential testing in Selenium WebDriver and proposes the Page Object Model (POM) design pattern as a solution. Sequential testing, where each interaction with a web page is defined in order, can be confusing and non-reusable, particularly when identifiers are not descriptive. The POM design pattern addresses these issues by encapsulating page interactions within classes, allowing for more descriptive method names and reusability across tests. Casperson illustrates this with a framework for testing the TicketMonster application, creating classes for each page like MainPage, EventsPage, VenuePage, CheckoutPage, and ConfirmationPage. These classes extend a BasePage class, which provides shared resources like an AutomatedBrowser instance and a default wait time for interactions. The design enhances maintainability by using constant variables for URLs and element identifiers, reducing hard-coded dependencies in test methods. This approach allows for more streamlined, readable, and maintainable test scripts that abstract away intricate details, enabling tests to focus on the user journey rather than the implementation specifics.