Creating WDA File for iOS App Testing

WebDriverAgent (WDA) plays an important role in automating iOS tests. It bridges the code we write for testing and the actual iOS app, which helps us control the app, test how it behaves, and make sure it works correctly. This article discusses the steps and prerequisites for creating WDA files.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure that you have:

• Paid Apple Developer Account
• Mac Machine
• Xcode and Xcode Command line tools

Steps to Create WDA File

1. Download from Appium Github.

2. Open WDA Xcode Project in Xcode.

   

3. On Signing & Capabilities, add Apple Account for wherever necessary in Target OS & Integrations.

   

4. Once the signing is done, run the following command to build the latest WDA WebDriverAgent. This command will build the WDA project and prepare it for testing.

   xcodebuild build-for-testing \
   -project WebDriverAgent.xcodeproj -scheme WebDriverAgentRunner \ 
   -destination 'id=<DEVICE_UDID>'  

5. Create a Zip Archive from the Products Folder
   Locate the Products folder within the Xcode derived data directory. The path looks like this:
   

   zip/Users/<user>/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData/WebDriverAgent-<RANDOM-STRING>/Build/Products

   Here, you need to replace with your username and with the random string associated with your WDA build.

6. Generating a New WDA for Installation

   Run the following commands to create a new WDA package for installation.

   xcodebuild -scheme WebDriverAgentRunner -sdk iphoneos -configuration Release -derivedDataPath /tmp/derivedDataPath
   cd /tmp/derivedDataPath/Build/Products/Release-iphoneos
   mkdir -p Payload
   mv WebDriverAgentRunner-Runner Payload
   zip Payload wda.zip
   mv wda.zip wda.ipa

The above commands will generate a new wda.ipa file.