Mastering Tab Navigation with Katalon Studio

Hello, Katalon users and software testing enthusiasts! Today, we’re diving into a common challenge that many of you have encountered: navigating through a web page using the ‘Tab’ key. This blog post is inspired by a real-life scenario shared by a Katalon user on our community forum.

The Challenge

The user was trying to automate a test case where they needed to launch a browser, open an application URL (like google.com), and once the page loaded, hit the ‘Tab’ key to verify that the first element in focus was a specific element. They had used the command WebUI.sendKeys(findTestObject('Object location'), Keys.chord(Keys.TAB)) with success in the past, but in this case, they were unable to focus on the URL and hit 'Tab’.

The Solution

Let’s break down the solution into simple steps:

Step 1: Launch the Browser and Open the URL

First, we need to launch the browser and open the application URL. This can be done using the WebUI.openBrowser('') and WebUI.navigateToUrl('http://google.com') commands in Katalon Studio.

Step 2: Wait for the Page to Load

Next, we need to ensure that the page has fully loaded before proceeding. We can use the WebUI.waitForPageLoad(5) command, which waits for the page to load within a specified timeout (in this case, 5 seconds).

Step 3: Set Focus and Hit ‘Tab’

Now comes the tricky part. We need to set the focus on the URL and hit ‘Tab’. This can be achieved using the WebUI.sendKeys(findTestObject('Object location'), Keys.chord(Keys.TAB)) command. However, if you’re unable to focus on the URL and hit ‘Tab’, you might need to use a different method to set the focus.

Conclusion

Navigating through a web page using the ‘Tab’ key can be a bit tricky, but with the right commands and a bit of patience, it’s definitely achievable. Remember, the Katalon Community forum is a great resource for finding solutions to common challenges.

The information in this blog post is based on a real-life scenario shared by a user on our Katalon Community forum and is intended to inspire peer-to-peer discussion and collaboration. Please always test solutions thoroughly before implementing them in a production environment.

Feel free to continue the discussion here.