Recording Virtual Services (Discovering)

You can start recording in any of the following ways:

The New Virtual Service dialog

The New Virtual Service dialogThe New Virtual Service dialog

1. Select the ReadyAPI Virtualization node and click Service on the toolbar:

   

   Click the image to enlarge it.

   – or –

   On the Dashboard, click Virtual API in the New Test tile:

   

   Click the image to enlarge it.

   This will invoke the New Virtual Service dialog.

2. In the dialog, select Record and then specify recording settings:

   

   • To record REST requests, select REST in the Protocol box.

   • To record SOAP requests, select SOAP in the Protocol box and set the WSDL specification to that, which ReadyAPI will add the recorded operations.

     If you have a WSDL definition in your project, select Existing WSDL. To record operations to a new WSDL, select New WSDL and enter the WSDL file name.

3. After you set the properties, click OK to continue. This will invoke the built-in browser (see below).

Note that, at the time of recording, the new virtual service does not exist. It will be created after the recording is over.

The Discover toolbar command

The Discover toolbar commandThe Discover toolbar command

Select the ReadyAPI Virtualization node in the Navigator panel and click Discover on the toolbar:

Click the image to enlarge it.

This will invoke the built-in browser (see below).

Note that, at the time of recording, the new virtual service does not exist. It will be created after the recording is over.

You send requests to an existing API from the browser that is built into ReadyAPI:

Click the image to enlarge it.

Before you start, select the functioning mode of the browser: Internal browser or Proxy.

Internal browser

To record traffic in this mode, simply specify the URL of the desired live API and click Go. To record another response for the same request, send this request one more time.

The browser sends GET requests via HTTP or HTTPS. So, this mode is typically used for recording REST requests of the GET type. To record SOAP traffic, as well as REST requests of other types, use the Proxy mode.

Proxy

In this mode, the internal browser functions as a proxy. You send requests from some other browser or a client application that resides on your computer or on a machine in your local network and the internal browser detects the traffic and records requests and responses. An example of a client application is cURL or a mobile client application (this approach helps you create virtual services for Internet-of-Things APIs).

To record traffic:

1. Before you send any request, configure the client application (or browser) to use the internal browser as a proxy. You can see the configuration settings for HTTP and HTTPS traffic in the internal browser’s window.
   The internal clients term means the client application running on your computer; external clients means client applications or browsers running on other machines in your network.

2. Send requests from the client application (or browser) to your live API.

You can view the recorded operation on the Transactions page of the built-in browser’s window (see below).

For more information on working with the internal browser, see Discovery.

To view recorded requests and responses, switch to the Transactions page:

Click the image to enlarge it.

Each line on the page corresponds to a transaction (operation). It has the incoming message (request) and outgoing message (response).

To view the context of a request or a response, simply click that request or response on the page. The contents (headers and body) will be shown on the right.

To create a virtual service, you need to select check boxes for those operations that you would like to add to your virtual API. Click Select All or Deselect All, if needed.

Filter Section

Use the Filter section at the top of the transaction list to find an operation quickly. You can filter operations by their method (like GET, PUT or POST), content type, response code or URL. All the drop-down lists contain the values that the recorded operations contain. For instance, if you have not recorded POST requests, the Method drop-down list will not have the POST item.

The URL filter applies only to the Incoming column. It searches for the operations whose URL contains the value you entered in the URL edit box. This search is case-sensitive.

During the recording, the new virtual service does not exist yet. To create it:

1. Select the needed operations on the Transactions page.

2. From the Virtual Service Type drop-down list (it is at the beginning of the Filter line), select the service type: REST or SOAP.

3. Click Create New Virtual Service in the bottom right corner of the internal browser window.

ReadyAPI will stop recording and will create virtual operations from the recorded requests and responses.

To add recorded operations to an existing virtual service, simply click Add to Existing Virtual Service and select the service in the subsequent dialog box.