REDCap Cypress Developer Toolkit

This repository includes scripts to download all the necessary components for a developer to begin developing automated feature tests on their developer machine with the REDCap Cypress Test Framework.

Windows Tutorial Video

macOS Tutorial Video

Overview

• Software Prerequisites
• Create SSH Key
• Developer Toolkit Installation Instructions
• Changing REDCap Versions
• Start REDCap Test Environment
• Configure & Start Cypress
• Contribute to Feature Tests
• Update Repositories
• Rebuild Docker Containers

Software Prerequisites:

A developer needs the following software on their machine before installing this Developer Toolkit.

• Git (version control)

  • for Windows
  • for macOS options (choose one)
    • Homebrew: brew install git
    • MacPorts: sudo port install git
    • Xcode - shipped as a binary package
  • for Linux

• Docker Desktop - available for Windows, macOS, Linux

• Node.js - available for Windows, macOS, Linux

• VS Code - This is the recommended IDE, but others may be used as well (e.g. PhpStorm). Be mindful that Visual Studio Code is most often referred to as VS Code in part to distinguish it from a different application simply called Visual Studio which we do not use.

• Cucumber Extension for VS Code by cucumber.io

SSH Key in GitHub Account

You will need to place your public key on GitHub for this process to work correctly.

To generate a key on your local machine, most of time the command is:

ssh-keygen

Please consult GitHub's SSH documentation for more information: GitHub SSH Key Instructions

Specifically, you will need to

• Generate a new SSH Key
• Add the SSH Key to your GitHub Account

Developer Toolkit Installation Instructions:

1. Clone this repository to your machine. ¹

   git clone [email protected]:aldefouw/redcap_cypress_docker.git
   

2. Download Repositories

   Execute download_repos.sh to download the repositories. ²

   cd redcap_cypress_docker
   ./download_repos.sh
   

   This script also configures base settings for Cypress.

3. Download REDCap

   Execute download_redcap.sh to download specific version of REDCap you need. ²

   ./download_redcap.sh
   

   Follow onscreen prompts. This step requires credentials for REDCap Community site.

Changing REDCap Versions

To test against a different version of REDCap, simply run ./download_redcap.sh again and specify the desired version.

Start REDCap Test Environment:

./run.sh

Contribute to Feature Tests:

1. Create your own fork of redcap_rsvc that is based upon https://github.com/aldefouw/redcap_rsvc

2. Configure the cloned redcap_rsvc repository as needed to match your own Fork.

cd redcap_cypress/redcap_rsvc
git remote rename origin upstream
git remote add origin <your_fork_url_here>

Having your own fork enables you to issue pull requests to aldefouw/redcap_rsvc after you complete a feature.

Update Repositories:

Execute ./update_repos.sh from this repository.

./update_repos.sh

This will resync your Developer Toolkit to the latest versions.

Caution: Only do this if you understand what the implications of updating submodules are.

Additional Information

Rebuild Docker Containers

If changes are made to the Docker images, you will need to rebuild your containers before spooling them up.

docker compose build

Issues and Resolutions:

Footnotes

1. Git Clone Fail: If the message says you do not have permissions or mentions a public key, you might need to setup a SSH key with Github. ↩

2. Shell Script not Running: If you are on Windows and you see no outputs, you will need to run in a Bash shell. Because you have Git, you might have Git Bash installed. At the top of your VS Code terminal, on the right, Click on the down-arrow next to the plus sign and select Git Bash. ↩ ↩²