Smalltalk Recorder

The Smalltalk Recorder records user input from the mouse and keyboard so that it can be playback later. It can be used to demo an application or as part of a test suite for regression testing.

Unlike other playback tools, this tool records the actual mouse and keyboard events instead of widget events (e.g., button pressed). Since only the low level events are recorded, a recording from one machine may not work on another machine.

User instructions:

To use the recorder simply load the parcels, and evaluate "SmalltalkRecorder open". This will open the recorders main window.

To make a recording, press the record button (top left). Select the list of windows that you want record the input for. Only windows selected and new windows opened after the recording starts will have their input recorded. Press the stop button (lower left) when you have finished a recording. You can pause the recording at any time by pressing the pause button (lower middle). Pressing it a second time will cause the recording to resume.

To playback a recording, press the play button (top middle). You can pause a playback by pressing the <F12> key and resume it by pressing it again. Pressing any other key causes the playback to be aborted. If your keyboard doesn't have a <F12> key you can setup your own pause key by redefining PlaybackInputState>>pauseKey.

To save a recording, press the save button (top right) and enter a filename into the dialog box.

To load a recording, press the load button (bottom right) and enter the filename to load into the dialog box.

Known bugs:

These are the only bugs known to exists. If you find any other bugs or have fixes to these bugs, please send mail to brant@cs.uiuc.edu.

• Recordings sometimes stop playback after a window opens (especially dialog boxes). This occurs more frequently on slower machines and may be a problem with the process priorities.
• Recordings that change the window size under Motif fail to have the window's position. As a result, when they are played back the windows move to the top left of the screen.
• After playback, the Smalltalk Recorder window may not accept input. You will need to click on another window, before you can enter input into the recorder window.

Comments or suggestions can be sent to brant@cs.uiuc.edu. Last updated on 23-Jan-99.