Automation Testing Interview Questions in Mumbai

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Running the same test logic with multiple data sets from Excel, CSV, JSON or a database, so coverage increases without duplicating code.

What is dryRun in Cucumber and when do you use it?

Cucumber and BDDEasy

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dryRun=true makes Cucumber parse all feature files and check every step has a matching definition without actually executing anything. It is fast and is useful after writing new features, during refactoring, or as a quick CI gate to catch undefined or ambiguous steps. It also prints snippets for missing step definitions that you can paste and implement.

A dropdown option list loads only after typing three letters. How do you automate selecting a value?

Selenium WebDriverMedium

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Type the text with sendKeys, wait for the suggestion list with visibilityOfAllElementsLocatedBy, then find the option whose text matches the required value and click it. Avoid selecting by index because suggestion order may change. If the list is virtualised, type more characters to narrow results. Verify the selected value in the input afterwards.

What is Docker and how does it help tests?

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Docker packages tools in containers so tests run identically everywhere; Selenium Grid and browsers can be started quickly in containers.

How do you group tests?

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Tag tests with groups = {"smoke","regression"} and include or exclude them in testng.xml to run chosen sets.

Which tests should run at each stage of a CI/CD pipeline?

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On every commit or pull request: unit tests, static checks and a fast API and UI smoke suite. After deploying to a test environment: broader API and integration tests. Nightly: full UI regression across browsers. Before or after production release: a short production-safe smoke and monitoring checks. Faster feedback first, heavier tests later.

How do you run Selenium tests in Docker containers in CI?

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Use official Selenium images, either standalone-chrome for simple runs or a Grid with hub and node containers via Docker Compose. The test container or Jenkins agent points RemoteWebDriver to http://selenium-hub:4444. Containers give the same browser version everywhere and are cleaned after each run. Add shm_size for Chrome stability and record videos for failed tests if needed.

How do you publish Allure or Extent reports from Jenkins?

Git, Maven and JenkinsMedium

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For Allure, install the Allure Jenkins plugin, configure the commandline tool, and add allure results: [[path: 'target/allure-results']] in the post always block. For Extent, archive the HTML file and use the HTML Publisher plugin to show it as a build link. Keep report history per build and share the link in failure notifications.

What is a quality gate in a CI/CD pipeline?

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A quality gate is a rule a build must pass before moving forward, such as all smoke tests passing, code coverage above a threshold, no critical static analysis issues, or no new high-severity vulnerabilities. If the gate fails, the pipeline stops and the change is not deployed. Gates make quality an automatic decision instead of a manual check.

What is polymorphism and how does it show up in Selenium?

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One interface, many forms. WebDriver driver = new ChromeDriver() lets the same test code run on any browser class that implements WebDriver.

What is REST Assured?

REST AssuredMedium

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A Java library that makes API tests readable using given-when-then, with easy request building, response validation and JSON path support.

What are the standalone, hub and node, and distributed modes of Selenium Grid 4?

Selenium Grid & DockerMedium

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Standalone runs every Grid component and a local node in a single process, which suits a laptop or a single container. Hub and node mode runs the router, distributor, queue and session map together as the hub, with separate node processes registering to it, which is the usual team setup. Fully distributed mode runs each component separately, often on Kubernetes, for very large grids that need independent scaling and high availability.

Your API tests started failing with SSL handshake errors on a new test server. What do you do?

REST AssuredMedium

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First confirm the server uses a self-signed or internal certificate. The proper fix is to import the company CA certificate into a truststore and configure REST Assured with trustStore(path, password). As a temporary measure in a test environment only, relaxedHTTPSValidation() skips checks. Never use relaxed validation against production, and raise the certificate issue with the infra team.

What is the difference between @BeforeTest and @BeforeMethod?

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@BeforeTest runs once before all methods in a test tag of testng.xml; @BeforeMethod runs before every test method.

You see ConcurrentModificationException in your test utility. What causes it and how do you fix it?

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It occurs when a collection is modified while being iterated with a for-each loop, for example removing items from an ArrayList inside the loop. Fix by using Iterator.remove(), removeIf(), collecting items to remove separately, or using CopyOnWriteArrayList or ConcurrentHashMap when threads share the collection. In parallel tests, shared lists are a common source.

How do you pass thread count and duration to a JMeter test from the command line?

Performance Testing with JMeterMedium

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// In the Thread Group fields use property functions with defaults Number of Threads: ${__P(users,10)} Ramp-up period: ${__P(rampup,30)} Duration (seconds): ${__P(duration,300)} // Then override them when running jmeter -n -t load.jmx -l out.jtl -Jusers=200 -Jrampup=120 -Jduration=1800

How do you start a standalone Chrome container and run your tests against it?

Selenium Grid & DockerEasy

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Run docker run -d -p 4444:4444 -p 7900:7900 --shm-size=2g selenium/standalone-chrome:latest, preferably with a pinned version tag instead of latest. It starts a mini Grid with one Chrome node. Point RemoteWebDriver to http://localhost:4444 with ChromeOptions and the tests run inside the container. Port 7900 lets you watch through noVNC. Stop it with docker stop when finished, or use --rm so it is removed automatically.

What are Java collections and which ones do testers use most?

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ArrayList and LinkedList for lists, HashSet for unique values, HashMap for key-value test data, and Iterator for traversing them, for example collecting web elements in a list.

What is serialization and deserialization in REST Assured?

REST AssuredMedium

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Serialization converts a Java object (POJO) into JSON for the request body; deserialization converts the response JSON back into a Java object. REST Assured does this automatically when Jackson or Gson is on the classpath: body(userPojo) serializes and response.as(User.class) deserializes. Using POJOs gives type safety, IDE support and cleaner assertions compared with hand-written JSON strings.

How do you handle a web table in Selenium?

Selenium WebDriverMedium

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Locate rows and columns with XPath such as //table//tr and //td, loop through them to read or click cells, or build the XPath dynamically from the row text.

Tell me about a time you moved from web automation to mobile automation.

Appium Mobile AutomationMedium

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Situation: my team needed Android regression tests and I only knew Selenium. Task: deliver a smoke suite in one month. Action: I learned Appium 2 setup, used Appium Inspector to find locators, asked developers to add accessibility ids, and reused our TestNG, POM and reporting structure with a new driver factory. Result: twenty smoke tests ran nightly on emulators within four weeks, and release smoke testing dropped from half a day to forty minutes.

What are TestNG and JUnit 5 differences that matter in automation?

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TestNG has built-in groups, dependencies, suite XML, DataProvider and flexible parallel options, which suit large Selenium suites. JUnit 5 has a modular platform, tags, parameterized tests, extensions and strong IDE and tool support, and is the default for Spring and Cucumber's JUnit Platform engine. Both are capable; the choice usually follows team standards and existing frameworks.

What is BDD and how does Cucumber work?

Cucumber and BDDMedium

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Behaviour-driven development writes scenarios in Given-When-Then Gherkin that map to step definitions in code, so business and QA share one language.

How do you pass the WebDriver to page objects in a parallel framework?

Page Object ModelMedium

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Use a DriverManager with a ThreadLocal<WebDriver>, created in @BeforeMethod and removed in @AfterMethod. Page objects receive the driver through the constructor or get it from DriverManager.getDriver(). Constructor injection is cleaner and easier to test. Never store the driver in a static field shared by all threads, or parallel tests will control each other's browsers.

What are the advantages of version control for test code?

Git, Maven and JenkinsMedium

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Git tracks changes, enables code review, branching and rollback and lets teams collaborate on the framework safely.

Implicit vs explicit vs fluent wait?

Selenium WebDriverEasy

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Implicit wait applies globally to element lookups. Explicit wait waits for a specific condition (WebDriverWait + ExpectedConditions). Fluent wait is an explicit wait with custom polling and ignored exceptions.

Selenium's driver version suddenly mismatches the browser version on agents. How do you prevent this?

Selenium WebDriverEasy

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Use Selenium Manager, built into Selenium 4.6 and later, which resolves the right driver automatically, so you do not commit driver binaries. In CI, pin browser versions using Docker images or browser options so all agents match. Avoid auto-updating browsers on test agents. Log the browser and driver versions at the start of each run to diagnose quickly.

How do you resolve a merge conflict in Git?

Git, Maven and JenkinsEasy

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Git marks conflicting sections with <<<<<<<, ======= and >>>>>>>. Open each file, decide which change to keep or combine both, remove the markers, then git add the files and complete with git commit (or git rebase --continue). Run the affected tests before pushing. Pull often and keep branches short-lived to reduce conflicts.

An API returns a list in random order and your assertion on the first element fails intermittently. How do you fix it?

REST AssuredEasy

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Do not assert on positions when the API does not guarantee order. Use order-independent Hamcrest matchers such as hasItem, hasItems or containsInAnyOrder on the extracted field, for example body("name", hasItems("Pen", "Book")). Or use GPath filtering like find { it.id == 42 } to pick the right item before checking its fields. If order matters for the feature, raise it as a requirement and request a sort parameter.

Tell me about a time a BDD conversation clarified a requirement before development started.

Cucumber and BDDMedium

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Situation: a story said users get a refund if an order is cancelled early. Task: write scenarios with the product owner and developer. Action: while writing examples I asked what early meant and whether shipped orders counted. The three of us found the story had no time limit and no rule for partial shipments, and we wrote four concrete scenarios. Result: the rules were fixed before coding, avoiding a rework that had happened in a previous sprint.

Your Selenium tests in CI produce blank screenshots in headless mode. What could be wrong?

Selenium WebDriverMedium

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The screenshot may be taken before the page renders, the window size in headless mode may be tiny, or the browser is crashing due to low shared memory in Docker. Set --window-size=1920,1080, use the new headless mode, wait for page content before capturing, and add --disable-dev-shm-usage or a larger shm size for containers.

What is a BasePage and what should it contain?

Page Object ModelMedium

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BasePage is a parent class for all page objects holding common things: the driver reference, a WebDriverWait, and helper methods such as click with wait, type, getText, waitForVisible and scrollIntoView. Child pages extend it and stay focused on page-specific locators and actions. Keep it small; if it grows into hundreds of methods, move helpers into separate utility classes using composition.

What causes an AmbiguousStepDefinitionsException?

Cucumber and BDDMedium

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It occurs when one Gherkin step matches two or more step definitions, usually because of broad regular expressions or duplicate methods in different classes within the glue. Fix it by making expressions more specific, anchoring regexes with ^ and $, or removing the duplicate. Keeping step definitions organised by domain and reviewing new steps in pull requests prevents it.

What is shift-left testing?

API Testing and CI/CDEasy

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Shift-left means testing earlier in the development cycle: reviewing requirements, writing acceptance criteria and test cases before coding, running unit and API tests on every commit, and giving developers fast feedback. Defects found early are cheaper to fix. In practice SDETs pair with developers, add tests to pull request pipelines and test APIs before the UI is built.

What is the scope of a step definition class instance in Cucumber?

Cucumber and BDDHard

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Cucumber creates a new instance of every glue class for each scenario. Instance fields therefore reset between scenarios, which keeps scenarios isolated. This is why you should not rely on static variables for state: they survive across scenarios and threads, causing order-dependent failures and clashes in parallel runs. Share state through injected context objects instead.

A test reading a properties file works in the IDE but fails in Jenkins with FileNotFoundException. Why?