Thoughts on DHH’s “System tests have failed” Article

It does not advocate avoiding E2E automated UI tests.

DHH, the creator of Ruby on Rails and my idol & hero, just published one article titled “System tests have failed”. From my memory, this is the first time DHH has written a dedicated article on E2E UI test automation.

Rails’ System Tests: in-browser E2E tests
“The system test directory holds system tests, which are used for full browser testing of your application. System tests allow you to test your application the way your users experience it and help you test your JavaScript as well. System tests inherit from Capybara and perform in browser tests for your application.”
— Ruby on Rails Doc.

E2E test automation is my domain (since 2005), and I am also quite familiar with Ruby on Rails development. In this article, I share my thoughts on this DHH’s article.

Below are some excerpts from DHH’s article:

“System tests remain as slow, brittle, and full of false negatives as they did a decade ago.”

“HEY today has some 300-odd system tests.”

“drive a headless browser through your actual interface”

“System tests remain as slow, brittle, and full of false negatives as they did a decade ago”