Postman getpostman
Download from here
Free tool is extremely useful. For paid services, check comparison here.
- Hit "+" to get a new tab
- Choose your verb (common are GET, POST, PUT, PATCH, DELETE)
- Enter URL and Send
- Can hover over Status and Headers to get more information
- Authorization - discrete fields for all of the various types. Docs here.
- Query/Path params - can enter in fields on "Params" tab rather than manipulate URL
- Body options - Raw is most commmon (application/json). GraphQL is a new beta tab that features auto-complete when using a schema.
- Code button allows you to generate snippets of code in various languages to make a request. Curl is useful to paste into a terminal.
- Go to Chrome Dev Tools
- On the Network tab, capture requests
- Right-click on a request
- Choose "Copy as cURL"
- Import into Postman
- Go to "Paste Raw Text" tab and paste, then Import
- Now you will have the request and all headers ready to go
- Environments are named sets of variables that are typically used to represent different contexts like test server vs. staging server vs. production
- Docs here
- Can dynamically change any value in a request
- Specify a variable like {{myVariable}}
- Can get/set in scripts as well
- Docs here
- Many dynamic variables like {{$guid}}, {{$timestamp}}, {{$randomFirstName}}, {{$randomInt}} and many more
- Use eyeball icon to quickly view/edit current environment and see global variables
- Hit gear icon (next to eyeball) to manage environments where you can duplicate, export, delete, and edit environments
- Current value is not sent to Postman servers. For Initial value, you can use things like "YOURPASSWORDHERE" for sensitive data, then can share with others to use same variable structure.
- Save requests into Collectons to organize/document or run as a set
- Can set things like Authorization, scripts, and variables at collection level
- Can further nest requests into folders for organization
- Can set Authorization at folder level. For tests, could have folders for Admin, Normal, and Read-Only user workflows, as an example.
- can fork, pull, merge with conflict resolution
- docs here
- Execute a set of requests
- Can choose environment, # of iterations and other options
- Results will show executions and test pass/fail
- Can use a CSV or JSON file to run requests with different variables for each variation.
- In next examples, collection runner with execute 3 iterations with different variable values for each one
CSV
variable1,variable2
foo,bar
apple,banana
ketchup,mustard
JSON
[
{
"variable1": "foo",
"variable2": "bar"
},
{
"variable1": "apple",
"variable2": "banana"
},
{
"variable1": "ketchup",
"variable2": "mustard"
}
]
- For data files, you would normally have variables to set up request and variables for what you expect in response like (error code, error message, body contents, etc.)
- Postman scripting is written using JavaScript
- Code is executed in the Postman Sandbox
- You have access to require a number of common libraries
- The
pmglobal object provides a number of useful functions like- pm.request - access properties of the request
- pm.response - access properties of response like status code, response time, body, headers
- pm.test - execute a test
- pm.expect - assert a value in a test
- pm.variables - access variables
- pm.environment - get/set environment variables
- pm.globals - get/set global variables
- pm.sendRequest - programmatically send a request
- Runs before request
- Typical used to set a variable
- Could programmatically make a request and set a variable from response (like get an API token)
Example:
const moment = require( "moment" );
const now = moment();
pm.environment.set("now_formatted", now.format() );
pm.environment.set("now_unix", now.unix() );
- Runs after request. Docs here
- Can test status code, response time, response body, etc.
- Can set a variable that a subsequent request might need (create a record and save id)
- Test assertions use Chai assertion library. Syntax help here
A few test examples:
pm.test("Status code is 200", function () {
pm.response.to.have.status(200);
});
pm.test("Response time is less than 500ms", function () {
pm.expect(pm.response.responseTime).to.be.below(500);
});
pm.test("Body looks correct", function () {
pm.expect(pm.response.text()).to.include("<title>Knock Me Out</title>");
});
- Docs here and repo is here
- CLI (command-line interface) tool that has feature parity with collection runner
- Can't always run in UI and want to integrate with build system / automated tests
- Install like
npm install -g newman - Run like
newman run collection.json -e environment.json --bail - Can run against exported files or against those saved to Postman servers
- For the ultimate flexibility / control, you can use Newman as a node dependency
- Not limited to Postman sandbox
Example:
const newman = require( "newman" );
newman.run( {
collection: require( "./lk-collection.json" ),
environment: require( "./lk-env" ),
reporters: "cli"
}, ( err, summary ) => {
if ( err ) {
throw err;
}
console.log( "Success", summary );
} );
- Gets a callback with error that can be checked/thrown and summary object that has a ton of information related to the run including results/timings
- Additionally, there are a number of events that you can attach to like:
const newman = require( "newman" );
newman.run( {
collection: require( "./lk-collection.json" ),
environment: require( "./lk-env" ),
reporters: "cli"
} ).on( "request", ( err, data ) => {
console.log( data.response.code );
} );
- Full docs here
- Postman offers a number of services and sets limits based on your edition. Compare here
- Monitor a collection.
- Choose how often and from which region requests are initiated
- Docs here
- Mock a collection. Provides a URL and does good matching to hit your APIs.
- Uses saved responses. Can match against saved responses by query params or status code.
- Can use
x-mock-response-codeto force mock to return a status code - Full docs here
- Generate documentation from a collection
- Uses descriptions (can be markdown)
- Uses body and saved responses from requests
- Can use a custom URL
- Docs here
- Instructions on how to generate a "Run in Postman" button here
