Develop Reference

How do I handle variations in HTMLControl Inner Text in a Page Object Pattern?

Here is a little background on the specifications of my project:
We use Specflow and Microsoft CodedUI Framework for UI Automation
I have built a PageFactory that combines three Abstract Base Classes : BasePage, BaseMap, and BaseValidator that all Maps, Pages, and Validators inherit
Our Application that we are automating has numerous workflows that make defined HTML Controls have different InnerText Values (HTMLComboBoxes for example)
Everything is and needs to be abstracted from the actual Specflow Test Code in the Page Object Pattern, no unique code can exist within a Specflow Step
In my Maps I have certain controls like a combobox that has an InnerText change if a certain workflow is selected. I need to build assertion and verification statements to make sure the InnerText is correct for the workflow that is selected. This is not a problem. However, I do not want to just define a new variable for every InnerText change(There are A LOT).
Is there any way I can account for the InnerText variations in the Page Object Pattern and not have to code a new variable for every single one?
Here is an example of a Map Entry:
public HtmlComboBox NextActionControlDropDownList()
{
var NextActionControlDropDownList = new PropertyExpressionCollection {
new PropertyExpression(HtmlComboBox.PropertyNames.Id, "MEDCHARTContent_EmmpsContent_nextActionControl_ActionDropDownList", PropertyExpressionOperator.EqualTo)
};
return Window.Find<HtmlComboBox>(NextActionControlDropDownList);
}
This is the Base Control definition. It can also be this:
public HtmlComboBox NextActionControlARFormalComplReview()
{
var NextActionControlARFormalComplReview = new PropertyExpressionCollection {
new PropertyExpression(HtmlComboBox.PropertyNames.Id, "MEDCHARTContent_EmmpsContent_nextActionControl_ActionDropDownList", PropertyExpressionOperator.EqualTo),
new PropertyExpression(HtmlComboBox.PropertyNames.InnerText, "--Select Action-- Return to USARC ", PropertyExpressionOperator.EqualTo)
};
return Window.Find<HtmlComboBox>(NextActionControlARFormalComplReview);
}
My thoughts so far were to maybe make another map and inherit it? But that wouldn't solve my initial problem of too many variables for a single control. I don't see how If statements would help either because it needs to be defined for the framework to find the control. Maybe I could store the differing values in a collection of sorts and have a parameter key value to access them... but that seems like I would run into a lot of issues.

If you try and see the methods under PropertyExpressionOperator you would see something called Contains.
new PropertyExpression(HtmlComboBox.PropertyNames.InnerText, "--Select Action--", PropertyExpressionOperator.Contains)

Best way to access attributes

I am working on a framework that uses some Attribute markup. This will be used in an MVC project and will occur roughly every time I view a specific record in a view (eg /Details/5)
I was wondering if there is a better/more efficient way to do this or a good best practices example.
At any rate, I have an a couple of attributes e.g:
[Foo("someValueHere")]
String Name {get;set;}
[Bar("SomeOtherValue"]
String Address {get;set;}
What is the most efficient way/best practice to look for these attributes/Act on their values?
I am currently doing something like this:
[System.AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Property)]
class FooAttribute : Attribute
{
public string Target { get; set; }
public FooAttribute(string target)
{
Target = target;
}
}
And in my method where I act on these attributes(simplified example!):
public static void DoSomething(object source)
{
//is it faster if I make this a generic function and get the tpe from T?
Type sourceType = source.GetType();
//get all of the properties marked up with a foo attribute
var fooProperties = sourceType
.GetProperties()
.Where(p => p.GetCustomAttributes(typeof(FooAttribute), true)
.Any())
.ToList();
//go through each fooproperty and try to get the value set
foreach (var prop in fooProperties)
{
object value = prop.GetValue(source, null);
// do something with the value
prop.SetValue(source, my-modified-value, null);
}
}

Attribute.GetCustomAttribute and PropertyInfo/MemberInfo.GetCustomAttribute is the recommended way of getting at attribute objects.
Although, I wouldn't normally enumerate all properties with attributes; you generally want to work a particular attribute so you'd just call GetCustomAttribute directly.If you're looking for attributes on any of your properties, enumerating those properties looking for attributes based on GetCustomAttribute() the way you're doing it, is the best way to do it.

There is not really much choice when dealing with attributes - your code is ok and reasonable as is, it is also unlikley to be your main performance concern. The only immediate thing is to drop ToList call as absolutely unnecessary.
Side notes: performance related question should look approximately
"I've measured my code and portion XXX seems to be taking too much time (YYY) . The time goal for this piece of code is ZZZ. Is my way of doing XXX reasonable/where can I improve it?".
Note that in you case you are missing YYY and ZZZ time portions - so you can't really say if it is slow for your case or not. And you may want to start measurements with DB/other IO bound operations as it more likely to speed up your overall code.
After you figured that this attribute related code is main perfomance issue you can consider some sort of caching of results or even code generation of some sort (either through caching lambdas that would set necessary values or even full blown IL generation).

Integration Test for All References of a Method Invocation

So, I've been searching around on the internet for a bit, trying to see if someone has already invented the wheel here. What I want to do is write an integration test that will parse the current project, find all references to a certain method, find it's arguments, and then check the database for that argument. For example:
public interface IContentProvider
{
ContentItem GetContentFor(string descriptor);
}
public class ContentProvider : IContentProvider
{
public virtual ContentItem GetContentFor(string descriptor)
{
// Fetches Content from Database for descriptor and returns in
}
}
Any other class will get an IContentProvider injected into their constructor using IOC, such that they could write something like:
contentProvider.GetContentFor("SomeDescriptor");
contentProvider.GetContentFor("SomeOtherDescriptor");
Basically, the unit test finds all these references, find the set of text ["SomeDescriptor", "SomeOtherDescriptor"], and then I can check the database to make sure I have rows defined for those descriptors. Furthermore, the descriptors are hard coded.
I could make an enum value for all descriptors, but the enum would have thousands of possible options, and that seems like kinda a hack.
Now, this link on SO: How I can get all reference with Reflection + C# basically says it's impossible without some very advanced IL parsing. To clarify; I don't need Reflector or anything - it's just to be an automated test I can run so that if any other developers on my team check in code that calls for this content without creating the DB record, the test will fail.
Is this possible? If so, does anyone have a resource to look at or sample code to modify?
EDIT: Alternatively, perhaps a different method of doing this VS trying to find all references? The end result is I want a test to fail when the record doesnt exist.

This will be very difficult: your program may compute the value of the descriptor, which will mean your test is able to know which value are possible without executing said code.
I would suggest to change the way you program here, by using an enum type, or coding using the type safe enum pattern. This way, each and every use of a GetContentFor will be safe: the argument is part of the enum, and the languages type checker performs the check.
Your test can then easily iterate on the different enum fields, and check they are all declared in your database, very easily.
Adding a new content key requires editing the enum, but this is a small inconvenient you can live with, as it help a log ensuring all calls are safe.

How can I pass a runtime method to a custom attribute or viable alternative approach

Basically I would like to do something like this at the top of my class (I know this doesn't work as it isn't a constant)....
[XmlStorage(IsSingleStorageFile = false, IsSubordinate = true,
StorageLocation = "posts" + GetBlogId()]
Where GetBlogId() would be a static utility method.
I'm building an xml storage framework for a blogging engine I am writing (partly a learning excercise, partly as I want to give something back to the open source) and I thought that the tidiest way to determine the storage location would be to use custom attributes since I would be to use a datacontractserializer anyway.
My only problem at present is determining the location for subordinate type whose location would be determined by the id of their parent. e.g Post < Blog.
My storage path would be something like this...
posts\blogid\postid.xml
Where the blog id would be determined by parsing the url and returning the associated blog. This would allow me to host multiple blogs in one installation whilst keeping post storage files separate to reduce memory overheads when loading posts.
Is this a straight no or is there a better way for me to do what I am attempting?
Edit:
Following John answer I tried this....
private static string GetSubordinatePath(Type type)
{
if (typeof(ISubordinate).IsAssignableFrom(type))
{
object instance = Activator.CreateInstance(type);
return (instance as ISubordinate).ParentGuid.ToString();
}
else
{
// TODO: Localize this.
throw new ArgumentException(
String.Format(
CultureInfo.CurrentCulture,
"The specified type '{0}' does not impliment the ISubordinate interface. Please edit the source appropriately to enable storage.",
type.GetType().Name));
}
}
Which would be called from the class reading the custom attribute.
This works nicely..

It's a straight no for attributes... the values are constants baked into the metadata.
One option you could use would be to have some sort of templating built into whatever uses the attributes... so you could have a storage location of posts\{GetBlogId()} and call the method at execution time. It's not exactly elegant though... you might want to consider using an interface instead.

C#: Attrbute for intellisense to show method only outside of assembly

Basically what I'm hoping for is something that would work like how the Obsolete attribute works with Intellisense and strikes the method text when typing out the name. What I'm looking for is an attribute that blocks the method from being seen with the assembly it's defined. Kind of like an reverse internal. Using 3.5 by the by.
Yeah sounds odd but if you need the reason why, here it is:
My current solution for lazy loading in entity framework involves having the generated many to one or one to one properties be internal and have a facade? property that is public and basically loads the internal property's value:
public ChatRoom ParentRoom
{
get
{
if(!ParentRoomInnerReference.IsLoaded)
{
ParentRoomInnerReference.Load();
}
return ParentRoomInner;
}
set
{
ParentRoomInner = value;
}
}
Problem with this is if someone tries to use the ParentRoom property in a query:
context.ChatItem.Where(item => item.ParentRoom.Id = someId)
This will blow up since it doesn't know what to do with the facade property when evaluating the expression. This isn't a huge problem since the ParentRoomInner property can be used and queries are only in the entity assembly. (IE no selects and such in the UI assembly) The only situation comes in the entity assembly since it can see both properties and it's possible that someone might forget and use the above query and blow up at runtime.
So it would be nice if there were an attribute or some way to stop the entity assembly from seeing (ie blocked by intellisense) the outward facing properties.
Basically inside the assembly see ParentRoomInner. Outside the assembly see ParentRoom. Going to guess this isn't possible but worth a try.
I do see that there is an attribute
for stopping methods from being
viewable
(System.ComponentModel.EditorBrowsable)
but it's choices are rather slim and
don't really help.

You can use the EditorBrowsableAttribute for this:
[System.ComponentModel.EditorBrowsable(System.ComponentModel.EditorBrowsableState.Never)]
public void MyMethod() {}
One thing to know, though: In c#, you will still get intellisense on the method if it is in the same assembly as the one you are working in. Someone referencing your assembly (or your project, for a project reference) will not see it though. You can also pass EditorBrowsableState.Advanced, and then you will only get intellisense if c# if you clear the HideAdvancedMembers option in Tools Options.

I haven't heard of a good way to do this in plain .NET. But, here are some ideas. Maybe one of them will work, or set you off in a direction that will be helpful.
Use FxCop, probably writing your own rule to make sure ParentRoom isn't called from the asslembly that defined it.
Look into the various post-processing projects for .NET (link design-by-contract).
Write some code inside your ParentRoom getter which will check the stack (using "new Stack()" or "new StackFrame(1)" to figure out whether the caller was from the same assembly. If so, either throw an exception or simply return ParentRoomInner.