Item: Selenium
Rating: 10
Author: Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Selenium

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Our business uses reports generated from a website that can only be accessed via a browser. Every week we download a copy of these reports for roughly 50 projects. There are 3 individual reports, which means there are roughly 150 individual downloads that need to be done. To complicate it further, I either need to have an accurate list of the current 50 projects, or I need to check each report as I go, to avoid downloading unnecessary reports.

Using Selenium tied to Microsoft Excel, I can use a SQL query to generate a list of the current projects, then I can automatically download all the required reports. This saves a ton of time and prevents errors.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Headless Web Browser
Browser Automation
Integration with Python and Microsoft Excel

Cons

Learning curve if you are new to HTML, VBA or scripting in general
No GUI, all code based (pro and con)
Constant need to update chromedriver file

Return on Investment

Significant time savings, several hours each week minimum
Less errors, accidents, miss-clicks
Consistent, correct, efficient data

Usability

For those who are unfamiliar with coding, there is a bit of a learning curve. There is plenty of helpful documentation and resources but it can take a little time to get the software up and running. Once you get the hang of how Selenium works, and what it can do, you realize how many things you can use it for, and how many processes you can automate.

Alternatives Considered

Playwright and Cypress.io

The excel integration was key for using Selenium. I needed to be able to pull excel reports and use SQL, so I needed to find a program that would work with Excel natively. Selenium allowed me to reuse some of my existing SQL code and add a level of automation that I was not able to fine with other programs.

Key Insights

Do you think Selenium delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Selenium's feature set?

Yes

Did Selenium live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Selenium go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Selenium again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Apple Business Essentials

Likelihood to Recommend

Selenium is the best product I have found for browser automation. For most users, they will likely not have a need for this type of software. But, in certain cases, there is no replacement for this program. I cannot imagine having to go back to our old process of pulling reports. I have saved countless hours and prevented countless accidental errors by using Selenium.

Selenium Feature Ratings

Comments

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Highly recommended for browser automation