Robot Framework Hackathon

We asked from our employees, what kind of training would be useful in their work and in many discussions Robot Framework came up. So, we wanted to offer a crash course on that. Also, while we believe that learning by doing is powerful, especially with software programming and frameworks, we decided to arrange a Robot Framework hackathon.

As an introduction to the topic, our Robot Framework specialist Sayed Tenkanen gave a Robot Framework 101 to the hackathon teams. Then it was time to start to “hack a ton” out of Robot Framework! We had teams participating in Helsinki and Oulu offices and the hackathon topic was to try out Robot Framework in a context selected by the team. Teams had one day time to make a demo implementation and then the results were presented in Symbio’s weekly virtual coffee break. The code the teams developed was available in a repository for everyone at Symbio to explore.

Efficient teamwork

Helsinki team used Liveshare to make working together more efficient. Everyone was working in the same room on their own computers and one machine was used to do the test run. The team used Selenium keywords library and wrote their own keyword library using Python. The team in Oulu faced challenges with web drivers in the beginning that took time from the actual implementation. However, after the initial challenges, the team reached full speed and both teams were able to complete the hackathon and give a demo run for the audience.

Feelings From Hackathon

As it usually goes in hackathons, the time flies fast. Teams were working enthusiastically and had fun in developing the solutions. Teams learned how the Robot Framework helps in making automations: it generates informative reports, and it is suitable for building almost any kind of automation. The participants were able to try integrations using different programming languages and everyone’s expertise in the world of test automation grew substantially.

The feedback from the participants was that a hackathon is a good way to learn something new by doing and that we should organize hackathons in the future as well.