While exploring an application in the Object Browser, you can also examine the hierarchy of the application’s user interface elements (panels, toolbars, menus, editors and so on). Each graphical element has a corresponding item in the Object Tree window. There are several ways to find out what Object Tree item relates to which window or control:

The Object Spy Window has the target glyph. Use it to select an onscreen element under the cursor. Just drag the glyph over the desired GUI element and release the mouse button. To select an element in a mobile application, drag the target glyph over the element on the Mobile Screen. Once you do this, the corresponding object will be chosen in the Object Spy window.
The context menu of the Object Tree panel holds the Highlight on Screen menu item. Selecting this item for a visible onscreen object activates a red blinking frame around the object (objects in mobile applications are highlighted on the Mobile Screen).

If the object selected in the Object Tree is not visible (when the object is hidden, or if it is not an onscreen object), then the command is ignored.

If you are going to highlight a web page element, you may need to set the zoom ratio of a web page to 100%. Else, the test engine may fail to determine the element’s coordinates correctly. See Preparing Web Browser.
The Object Tree’s context menu has another command, View Object, that is very useful when locating graphical elements. Choosing this menu item for an onscreen object brings up the Image Viewer window with the image of the onscreen object.

Exploring an Application's Graphical User Interface

See Also