General availability of major new DOM analysis commands in its Patented eValid™ Website Test & Analysis Suite has been announced by Software Research, Inc.

Based on the current content of the DOM of a rapidly changing web page, eValid has introduced a powerful set of DOM Element Manipulation/Motion commands that provide direct control of test script playback. To relieve web application testers of the need to rebuild test scripts when pages change structure, content, or layout is the basic ideea of these commands.

Including AJAX applications, this new capability allows testers to address complex applications and create test scripts that operate correctly, independent of the way the pages they are testing are actually constructed. Test scripts, as a result, have longer life and overall regression testing costs are minimized.

To operate based on the logical order of objects on the page, eValid scripts recorded "from life" are edited into the new commands. The commands manipulate the sourceIndex where the object lies on the page, identify objects by their properties and/or page location, and take action on the object (e.g. click on it). More than fifteen command variations are available, a variety that covers all DOM manipulation and motion operations.

President of Software Research, Edward Miller, declared: "The new DOM manipulation commands close a BIG testing gap that's been around for a long time: producing good, reliable, tests for pages which change their details drastically due to normal updates or due to dynamic page generation schemes - for example, like those used in modern AJAX applications."

Miller added: "The ability to search the DOM for page element matches with regular expressions is a super-powerful way to allow test scripts to operate correctly, and reliably, whether they are used in regression testing, application monitoring, or server loading roles."