Is it a good/bad practice to combine Robotframework keywords and page objects?

user_1808867 0
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So I have this case where I want to combine the keywords files with the page objects files.

Let's assume I have foo.robot for keywords and bar.robot for page object:

#foo.robot
*** Settings ***
Ressource  bar.robot

*** Keywords ***
Click Submit Button
   Wait Untile Element Is Visible  ${variable_from_bar}  60s
   Click Button                    ${variable_from_bar}

#bar.robot
*** Variables ***
${variable_from_bar}               //button[@id="dummybutton"]

my idea is to combine them both like this

#foobar.robot

*** Variables ***
${variable_from_bar}               //button[@id="dummybutton"]

*** Keywords ***
Click Submit Button
   Wait Untile Element Is Visible  ${variable_from_bar}  60s
   Click Button                    ${variable_from_bar}

Is there any particular reason why I shouldn't do this practice? Or any technical issue that would face me in the future after applying it?

robotframework
1 Answers

Generally I would suggest to rename .robot to .resource so resource files will be distinguished from suite files in naming as well.

As for the combination I think it is not a bad approach but the hierarchy can be a bit more separated. Let's say there are web elements that are used across multiple pages you want to put those into separate resource files independent from the page object resource file.

Let's say there is a unique button.

button.resource

*** Keywords ***
Click Unique Button
    [Arguments]    ${button_locator}
    # Handle some unique behaviour
    Click Button    ${button_locator}

This could be used across multiple pages where the purpose of the button is different, the ID different but still the way a button click should be handled is the same.

PageA.resource

*** Settings ***
Resource    button.resource

*** Variables ***
${variable_from_bar}               //button[@id="dummybutton"]

*** Keywords ***
Do Stuff
    Click Unique Button    ${variable_from_bar}

PageB.resource

*** Settings ***
Resource    button.resource

*** Variables ***
${download_file}               //button[@id="downloadbutton"]

*** Keywords ***
Do Stuff
    Select File    my_file.txt
    Click Unique Button    ${download_file}

To summarize you could merge the page object keywords and locator variables into the same file but you should keep the generic, page independent keywords in their own resource files.

user_38200250
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