Managing Chrome Updates is a nightmare?
It appears that managing updates to Google Chrome is a complete nightmare when working with TestComplete. I am curious how others manage this. This week Google pushed out Chrome 42 and all my PCs...
Forum Discussion
Agree with Ryan. This is rudamentary stuff. I dont work with the Chrome plugin but I would hope that the Test Complete developers test on the Beta version and have patches ready to roll out the day the changes go into Chrome. I worked with a web based product for a couple of years that only had support for Chrome and that development team always had time to prepare before a breaking change went into Chrome. Also, as QA we tested on Beta to be ready for any changes.
"cannot find an offline version of Chrome 41"
This is what makes Chrome even more annoying. Stopping the **bleep** thing auto-updating is annoying enough. And it usually finds a way, no matter what you do.
And then, to make matters worse, finding an installer for an older version is nigh on impossible. FileHippo used to have them, but not any more.
Personally, I simply keep a copy of the offline installer of a current working version of Chrome. If things get out of sync, I just uninstall Chrome, re-install, and then do all the usual stuff with trying to stop it updating. (Still have to try Alex's folder renaming method!) So at least I have a way to go backwards rather than simply being stuck with broken software. This usually keeps me going until patches arrive.
That said, I only maintain my own PC and a couple of VM's. I wouldn't want to have to back-install 42 PC's either.
Why they can't just have an option to allow you to choose when updates are installed (you know, like every other piece of software on the planet) is beyond me .....
@Colin, Forcing updates for Chrome browser makes sense to me. It means security issues get patched quickly and you don't have your user base using all different versions. I worked on a product for 2 years that was only officially supported on Chrome and once you have a process in place for testing on Beta versions it really isn't an issue.
I see the only issue here is to whether SmartBear has patches available when Chrome updates. Given there are dev and beta versions of Chrome availabe there isnt really a reason why SmartBear cant test against these versions to be sure Test Complete continues working when Chrome updates.
@SmartBear, does the Test Complete development team test against Beta versions of browsers to ensure features will continue to work when the browsers update?
I see the only issue here is to whether SmartBear has patches available when Chrome updates.
Then you are missing my whole point.
The main issue is if I go to work at 5 a.m. on Sunday to test the new version of our software after a deployment and discover there is a Chrome update then I am screwed because I would have to update 42 PCs and apply a patch to 42 PCs BEFORE I could test in Chrome.
While I agree that Smartbear can and should be testing patches on Beta versions of Chrome, whether they have the patch available the day a Chrome update occurs is irrelevant to my point.
Is it still possible to host Chrome plugins outside the web store? If so then you could put in feature request to SmartBear to host their own plugin updates and configure the Chrome plugin to auto update . This used to be the work around for deploying plugin updates to users for plugins that were not in the Chrome store. As for Test Complete updates, perhaps another feature request to be able to launch Test Complete from the command line and force an update if one is available?
