How to find a JavaScript alert that is already open with WatiN

I tagged @ ProgrammerV5's answer as a real answer since it led me to this code. I am only posting this answer because it relates directly to SpecFlow and WatiN.

I had three different SpecFlow steps, which clicked the button that spawned alert

, claim the alert box has the text I was expecting, and finally the final step to click OK.

Sample SpecFlow Script

Scenario: Doing something really important
    When I click the "Save and Continue" button
    Then I should see the validation error alert
    When I click OK in the validation error alert
    Then I continue on with the rest of this Scenario...

      

        
        
        
      

    

First, I created a quick helper method for finding a dialog alert

:

TestProject / helpers / StepHelper.cs

public static class StepHelper
{
    [DllImport("User32.dll")]
    public static extern Int32 FindWindow(String lpClassName, String lpWindowName);

    public static WatiN.Core.Native.Windows.Window GetAlertBox()
    {
        IntPtr hwndTmp = (IntPtr)FindWindow("#32770", "Message from webpage");
        return new WatiN.Core.Native.Windows.Window(hwndTmp);
    }
}

      

        
        
        
      

    

This allows you to capture a field alert

in Internet Explorer 8

Step definition for When I click the "Save and Continue" button

:

[When(@"I click the ""(.*)"" button")]
public void WhenIClickTheButton(string buttonText)
{
    Button button = browser.Button(Find.ByValue(buttonText).Or(Find.ByText(buttonText)));
    Assert.IsTrue(button.Exists, "No button with text '{0}' was found", buttonText);
    button.ClickNoWait();
}

      

        
        
        
      

    

When called button.Click()

or button.ClickNoWait()

a warning window is displayed. Simply calling the method Click()

will cause WatiN to wait for this event to complete before returning from the method call. Since the warning window was open and blocking the page, the click event did not complete, which caused the call Click()

to be stopped completely. I got around this by calling ClickNoWait()

which is a "shoot and forget" way to click an element on the page. A warning window now appears, but the test runner can proceed to the next SpecFlow step.

Step definition for Then I should see the validation error alert

:

[Then(@"I should see the validation error alert")]
public void ThenIShouldSeeTheValidationErrorAlert()
{
    var alert = StepHelper.GetAlertBox();

    Assert.IsTrue(alert.Message.Contains("An error has occurred"),
        "An alert was found, but contained the wrong message ('{0}')", alert.Message);
}

      

        
        
        
      

    

Here I am using the method StepHelper.GetAlertBox()

I created earlier to get the handle to the object WatiN.Core.Native.Windows.Window

that represents the alert box. Then the simple Assert.IsTrue

, provisioning message shown in the alert is actually our Validation Failure message (we have another alert on this page).

Finally, we need to close the warning window.

Step definition for When I click OK in the validation error alert

:

[When(@"I click OK in the validation error alert")]
public void WhenIClickOKInTheValidationErrorAlert()
{
    var alert = StepHelper.GetAlertBox();

    Assert.IsTrue(alert.Message.Contains("An error has occurred"),
        "An alert was found, but contained the wrong message ('{0}')", alert.Message);

    alert.ForceClose();
}

      

        
        
        
      

    

Here we just get the alert box object from the helper and call ForceClose

to close the alert box, since clicking the OK or X in the top right corner does the same.