Thread by @FriendlyTester

I will continue to push back on folks comparing Selenium to UI testing tools.
It's unfair to both parties, devalues both.
Also doesn't help with the illusion we have as an industry where we claim to use to selenium to do our UI testing.
You can't just use Selenium

Therefore we sell ourselves short, we don't truly share all the skills we've learnt, other frameworks we've learnt, and the coding ability to glue them all together. We say we use Selenium.
So newbies to testing/automation believe they just need to learn Selenium...

So when they start they struggle and fail, because the illusion gets broken that's it's just 'Selenium'. Acknowledge, share and appreciate all that's needed to build a UI tool from scratch based on Selenium. Break the illusion and let folk understand what it takes

And not just current/future testers/engineers but managers and C level who think you just need selenium and then don't provide time/training for folks to succeed. The illusion means they will likely fail.

Clearer distinctions will then increase the appreciation for frameworks like Selenide, SeleniumBase and all the others. Frameworks that are designed for the problem most folk are trying to solve,UI testing, not browser driving. Frameworks that you can hit the ground running with

Let me clear though,I'm not advocating you all use existing UI testing frameworks, I'm advocating you paint the true picture of rolling your own UI testing framework based on Selenium. I'm advocating those that have built UI frameworks compare correctly, it will benefit them.

Rolling your own and utilising existing both have pros and cons, and your team's testability will influence choices. But please let's be clearer about all the pieces you need to do UI/E2E testing and compare approaches and solutions accurately and fairly to all parties

And let's not forget coding skills and practises. Understanding good abstraction, composition, naming conventions, good naming, clean code and so forth.

I still call objects Dave because the right name hasn't come to me yet!