Set up team agents

Agents run your tests. A team agent is an agent that's installed on your premises, typically on a dedicated virtual machine. Unlike personal agents, team agents are available to your entire team for test runs. The results are also visible to all.

Before you start

First off, verify that you have administrator rights for Tosca Cloud. Only administrators can connect team agents.

Then, get your agent machine ready:

  • Make sure it's for testing only. Testers can access, read, and modify data through their tests. Tosca Cloud records the desktop of the agent machine during test runs, and takes screenshots as well if LiveView is on. Plus, the machine's blocked during test runs. You don't want any of that on someone's personal machine.

  • Make sure it meets the system requirements.

  • Make sure it has all applications installed that you plan to test on it. For example, to run tests in Mozilla Firefox, the machine needs Mozilla Firefox installed.

Set up your agent

To set up a team agent, follow these steps:

  1. Install the local components for Tosca Cloud.

  2. Go to Agents and select Set up team agent (if this is your first agent) or Add new agent (if you already have agents).

  3. In the setup wizard, enter a name for your agent. If you don't define a name, the agent gets the default ID {MachineName}-{UserName}.

  4. Modify the agent settings according to your needs.

  5. On the next screen, add a characteristic and select Enter. Repeat this as often as you need.

    You can enter alphanumeric characters, underscores, or hyphens. The name must have a minimum of 2 and a maximum of 63 characters.

  6. On the next screen, take note of two items you need to copy and paste. Then proceed:

    • Open the Command Prompt window, paste the first item, and run the command.

    • In the resulting pop-up, paste the second item and confirm.

  7. Optionally, configure your agent for auto-restart, so you don't have to manually restart it after machine reboots.

  8. Close the setup wizard and the Command Prompt window.

Your team agent is now visible on the Agents page and ready to run tests.

Agent settings

During the setup, you can choose the following settings for your team agent:

Setting

Description

Keep the display on while agent is running

Keep the display on even if there's no activity on the agent.

This means the agent always consumes resources, but it's also always ready to run tests. Agents in sleep mode can't run tests.

Turn on LiveView on the agent

Take screenshots every two seconds and display them in the agent details.

Only activate this setting if you're absolutely sure that your agent never displays any sensitive data on the screen, either while running tests or not.

Tosca Cloud keeps LiveView screenshots for 24 hours after the agent disconnects.