Digital Shelf

It’s more of a personal collection—random things I come across, resources worth remembering, and thoughts I might want to come back to later. Just a place to keep track of it all.

Docker + Cypress

Precondition Install Docker Desktop: https://www.docker.com/products/docker-desktop/ Example setup: Core Idea Image = instructions (what to install + what to run) Container = running version of image Flow: Cypress Docker images: https://github.com/cypress-io/cypress-docker-images Dockerfile .dockerignore package.json docker-compose.yml Commands (minimal reference) Build image Run container Using docker-compose (recommended) When to Rebuild Rebuild if you change: Dockerfile pa

Mar 181 min read

Environment Variables in Cypress

Hardcoding credentials, API URLs, or environment-specific values in tests is not ideal.It makes tests harder to maintain and can expose sensitive information. Cypress provides several ways to manage environment variables, allowing tests to run across different environments (dev, QA, staging, production) without changing the test code. This page is a reference for the most common approaches. Why Use Environment Variables? Environment variables help: Avoid hardcoding credential

Mar 52 min read

NPM Scripts for Cypress

Typing full Cypress CLI commands every time gets old fast. Instead of this: npx cypress run --spec "cypress/e2e/firstTest.cy.js"npx cypress run --spec "cypress/e2e/firstTest.cy.js" --browser firefox Create reusable NPM scripts once — then just run: npm run cypress:smoke-firefox Cleaner. Faster. Better for CI. Why Use NPM Scripts? Avoid repeating long terminal commands Standardize execution across the team Simplify CI/CD pipelines Centralize configuration in one place (package

Mar 22 min read

Skip Login With Saved Token in Cypress

Typing email + password in every test is slow and noisy. Cypress can skip the login screen completely by grabbing a token via API and placing it into localStorage before the app loads. This is a practical reference showing the before vs after, plus a reusable custom command. Why This Helps UI login usually costs ~8 seconds per test run (open page, fill fields, submit, wait UI). Token-based login can cut it to ~5 seconds because it avoids the whole form flow. Tests become clea

Feb 281 min read

API Basics for QE

This post explains how APIs work from a QA perspective and how they fit into modern testing strategies. It focuses on concepts that are useful in daily work and commonly discussed during interviews. What Is an API? API stands for Application Programming Interface, but in practice it means how applications communicate. A typical flow looks like this: A client (browser or mobile app) sends a request A server processes it A response is sent back This request–response cycle happe

Feb 92 min read

DOM Terminology

The DOM represents the HTML structure of a page and can be inspected using developer tools available in most browsers. The DOM consists of HTML elements, which are defined by tags. Each HTML element has a tag name , such as <div> or <input>. Tags usually appear in pairs with an opening and closing tag, but some elements like <input> are self-closing. Within these tags, attributes are specified. Attributes consist of a name and a value , for example, type="email". Attributes

Jun 28, 20252 min read