BTerminal/v2/tests/e2e/README.md

E2E Tests (WebDriver)

Tauri apps use the WebDriver protocol for E2E testing (not Playwright directly). The app runs inside WebKit2GTK on Linux, so tests interact with the real WebView.

Prerequisites

• Rust toolchain (for building the Tauri app)
• Display server (X11 or Wayland) — headless Xvfb works for CI
• tauri-driver installed: cargo install tauri-driver
• webkit2gtk-driver system package: sudo apt install webkit2gtk-driver
• npm devDeps already in package.json (@wdio/cli, @wdio/local-runner, @wdio/mocha-framework, @wdio/spec-reporter)

Running

# From v2/ directory — builds debug binary automatically, spawns tauri-driver
npm run test:e2e

The wdio.conf.js handles:

1. Building the debug binary (cargo tauri build --debug --no-bundle) in onPrepare
2. Spawning tauri-driver before each session
3. Killing tauri-driver after each session

CI setup (headless)

# Install virtual framebuffer + WebKit driver
sudo apt install xvfb webkit2gtk-driver

# Run with Xvfb wrapper
xvfb-run npm run test:e2e

Writing tests

Tests use WebdriverIO with Mocha. Specs go in specs/:

import { browser, expect } from '@wdio/globals';

describe('BTerminal', () => {
  it('should show the status bar', async () => {
    const statusBar = await browser.$('.status-bar');
    await expect(statusBar).toBeDisplayed();
  });
});

Key constraints:

• maxInstances: 1 — Tauri doesn't support parallel WebDriver sessions
• Mocha timeout is 60s — the app needs time to initialize
• Tests interact with the real WebKit2GTK WebView, not a browser

File structure

tests/e2e/
├── README.md          # This file
├── wdio.conf.js       # WebdriverIO config with tauri-driver lifecycle
├── tsconfig.json      # TypeScript config for test specs
└── specs/
    └── smoke.test.ts  # Basic smoke tests (app renders, sidebar toggle)

References

• Tauri WebDriver docs: https://v2.tauri.app/develop/tests/webdriver/
• WebdriverIO docs: https://webdriver.io/
• tauri-driver: https://crates.io/crates/tauri-driver