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AWS Community ASEAN profile image Jaira Encio
Jaira Encio for AWS Community ASEAN

Posted on • Updated on

Creating an API that runs Selenium via AWS Lambda

#serverless #lambda #selenium

Being an automation tester, my job is to automate everything. As I was running my test script via terminal I realised that I’m the only who can execute the scripts I made. What if someone wants to run it? like the Devs, Project Manager, etc. It would be a tedious task to clone my repo, install libraries, and run the script. So I decided that maybe I can store my test script inside a serverless machine and make it accessible via API request.

I experimented with various AWS resources such as creating my own lambda function, checking features of API gateway, Codepipeline, etc. After several attempts, I was finally able to run my script inside. And then I just researched how to access my lambda via API.

This will result in higher production and time savings. Engineers may focus on vital work because automated testing does not require human interaction. This is like a portable testing device that anyone could execute. With fast test execution, developers get testing reports in an instant, so whenever a failure occurs, they will react to it quickly. Test automation will make it easier to update programs quickly. As a result, automated testing leads to increased team responsiveness, improved user experience, and increased customer satisfaction.

Overview

  1. Create 2 Lambda layers that has selenium and chromedriver libraries
  2. Include created lambda layers in serverless.yml of lambda then deploy

Creating Selenium Lambda Layer

Place libraries in python/lib/python3.6/site-packages/ to include them in a layer.

Download Selenium to layer directory

$ pip3.6 install -t selenium/python/lib/python3.6/site-packages selenium==3.8.0
$ cd selenium
$ zip -r python.zip python/
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Once finished, Create lambda layer then upload zip file

1. Go to AWS Console Lambda/Layers
2. Click Create Layer
3. Input the following in the layer configuration

Name: selenium
Description: Selenium layer
Upload zip file created: python.zip
Compatible runtimes: Python 3.6
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selenium-layer

4. Click Create

Note: You can user whatever version you prefer, you just need to select compatible runtime when uploading your package

 Creating Chromedriver Lambda layer

Download chrome driver

$ mkdir -p chromedriver
$ cd chromedriver
$ curl -SL https://chromedriver.storage.googleapis.com/2.37/chromedriver_linux64.zip > chromedriver.zip
$ unzip chromedriver.zip
$ rm chromedriver.zip
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Download chrome binary

$ curl -SL https://github.com/adieuadieu/serverless-chrome/releases/download/v1.0.0-41/stable-headless-chromium-amazonlinux-2017-03.zip > headless-chromium.zip
$ unzip headless-chromium.zip
$ rm headless-chromium.zip
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Compress driver and binary

$ ls
chromedriver headless-chromium
$ zip -r chromedriver.zip chromedriver headless-chromium
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Once finished, Create lambda layer then upload zip file

1. Go to AWS Console Lambda/Layers
2. Click Create Layer
3. Input the following in the layer configuration

Name: chromedriver
Description: chrome driver and binary layer
Upload zip file created: chromedriver.zip
Compatible runtimes: Python 3.6
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chrome-layer

4. Click Create

 Creating Lambda Function

To ensure that your function code has access to libraries included in layers, Lambda runtimes include paths in the '/opt' directory.

 File Structure 

── /lambda/            # lambda function
  ├── /handler.py      # source code of lambda function 
  └── /serverless.yaml # serverless config
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 Code

Copy the code below to /lambda/handler.py

from selenium import webdriver
from selenium.webdriver.chrome.options import Options

def main(event, context):
    options = Options()
    options.binary_location = '/opt/headless-chromium'
    options.add_argument('--headless')
    options.add_argument('--no-sandbox')
    options.add_argument('--single-process')
    options.add_argument('--disable-dev-shm-usage')

    driver = webdriver.Chrome('/opt/chromedriver',chrome_options=options)
    driver.get('https://www.google.com/')

    driver.close();
    driver.quit();

    response = {
        "statusCode": 200,
        "body": "Selenium Headless Chrome Initialized"
    }

    return response
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Copy the code below to /lambda/serverless.yaml.

service: selenium-lambda

provider:
  name: aws
  runtime: python3.6
  region: ap-southeast-2
  timeout: 900

functions:
  main:
    memorySize: 1000
    handler: handler.main
    events:
      - http:
          path: test
          method: get

    layers:
      - arn:aws:lambda:ap-southeast-2:{}:layer:chromedriver:2
      - arn:aws:lambda:ap-southeast-2:{}:layer:selenium:2

resources:
  Resources:
    ApiGatewayRestApi:
      Properties:
        BinaryMediaTypes:
          - "*/*"
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 Deploy Lambda Function

Go to /lambda directory

$ sls deploy
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 Output 

Serverless: Stack update finished...
Service Information
service: selenium-lambda
stage: dev
region: ap-southeast-2
stack: selenium-lambda-dev
api keys:
  None
endpoints:
  GET - https://{name}.execute-api.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/dev/test
functions:
  main: selenium-lambda-dev-main
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output

You should get same response as below when accessing API

{
"statusCode": 200,
"body": "Selenium Headless Chrome Initialized"
}
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This deployment automatically creates cloudformation stack and s3 bucket.

Cloudformation stack

S3

Deprecation note:

Since python3.6 has been deprecated, you can try using the ff packages compatible with 3.9. note that if this exceeds lambda function zip file, you can try using docker image or uploading to s3 instead.

$ python3.9 -m pip install -t python/lib/python3.9/site-packages selenium==4.5.0
$ cd selenium
$ zip -r python.zip python/
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Name: selenium
Description: Selenium layer
Upload zip file created: python.zip
Compatible runtimes: Python 3.9

$ mkdir -p chromedriver
$ cd chromedriver
$ curl -SL https://chromedriver.storage.googleapis.com/107.0.5304.62/chromedriver_linux64.zip > chromedriver.zip
$ unzip chromedriver.zip
$ rm chromedriver.zip
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$ curl -SL https://github.com/adieuadieu/serverless-chrome/releases/download/v1.0.0-57/stable-headless-chromium-amazonlinux-2.zip > headless-chromium.zip
$ unzip headless-chromium.zip
$ rm headless-chromium.zip
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References for new releases:
chromedriver release
https://chromedriver.chromium.org/downloads

serverless-chrome release
https://github.com/adieuadieu/serverless-chrome/releases

Checkout Achim's comment on how he used 3.9 using dockerimage
https://dev.to/achimgrolimund/comment/22d99

Jaira Encio Linkedin

Oldest comments (48)

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quibski profile image
quibski •

Surely many Devs and QA will benefit from this. Hopefully a demo can be made/shown

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tchua profile image
tchua •

+1 to this, a demo would be great!

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jairaencio profile image
Jaira Encio •

uhm hahaha

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chrisjeriel profile image
chrisjeriel •

Great work! A well-thought-out article, straightforward and concise. Looking forward more advanced implementations.

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lunchcodes profile image
LunchCodes •

Exactly what I needed! Thank you!

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raphael_jambalos profile image
Raphael Jambalos •

The article is very helpful! It brings automation to the next level. By having running automated tests in a more automated way, developers will be empowered to make sure their code runs optimally.

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jlgarcia profile image
jltuts •

Good job jai! Very helpful!

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chiggy_wiggy profile image
Maynard Prepotente • • Edited

Great Job! Will definitely help a lot of Devs and QA! Adding screenshots of the output will make the job easier tho =)

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rolinj profile image
rolinj •

Kudos Jai! Great tutorial indeed!
For reference, may you add as well some screenshots of the created cloudformation stack and s3 bucket on the output section? Thanks :D

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jairaencio profile image
Jaira Encio •

Uploaded screenshots of cloudformation and s3 bucket. Thanks for the feedback :)

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ivy07 profile image
Ivy ☕ •

Great help! Will definitely need more articles like this un the future.

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ranzeyxc profile image
ranzey •

Huge help! :)

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silencer017 profile image
silencer017 •

Well done, this is very informative!

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jobad profile image
Badjo Badiola •

This is AWSome! thank you!

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em__sia profile image
e •

Naks! Great job! Screenshots will be helpful too. And a milk-tea will do. Thanks! Ahahahhahaha. :)

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youngcto profile image
youngcto •

Live Demo here: youtu.be/qIcVGDEjtt4?t=3482 (part of the June Meetup)

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da_shen_a7cf582bace0b4404 profile image
Da Shen •

tested working.. good article. note that Python runtime has to be 3.6. It won't work otherwise.

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awolad profile image
Awolad Hossain •

@jairaencio It's working great. But I can't use the selenium-stealth plugin. Getting an error. Message: unknown error: Chrome failed to start: exited abnormally\n (Driver info: .....

from selenium import webdriver
from selenium.webdriver.chrome.options import Options
from selenium_stealth import stealth

def lambda_handler(event, context):
    options = Options()
    options.binary_location = '/opt/headless-chromium'    
    options.add_argument("start-maximized")
    options.add_experimental_option("excludeSwitches", ["enable-automation"])
    options.add_experimental_option('useAutomationExtension', False)

    driver = webdriver.Chrome('/opt/chromedriver',chrome_options=options)

    stealth(driver,
        languages=["en-US", "en"],
        vendor="Google Inc.",
        platform="Win32",
        webgl_vendor="Intel Inc.",
        renderer="Intel Iris OpenGL Engine",
        fix_hairline=True,
        )

    driver.get('https://quizlet.com/446134722/it-management-flash-cards/')

    driver.close();
    driver.quit();

    response = {
        "statusCode": 200,
        "body": "Selenium Headless Chrome Initialized"
    }

    return response
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jairaencio profile image
Jaira Encio •

Hi @awolad I think you need to include the stealth library package in your lambda layer. Notice in my tutorial I have 2 different lambda layers for my selenium and chromedriver package. You can create another lambda layer or just simply include it in the 2 layers

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awolad profile image
Awolad Hossain •

@jairaencio Yes, I've added the stealth library package in the selenium lambda layer. There is no import error.

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jairaencio profile image
Jaira Encio •

Great! Always happy to help :)

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awolad profile image
Awolad Hossain •

@jairaencio Sorry, It's not solved yet. I mean the error is not related to the import the stealth package issue. Because the package is already in my lambda layer. The driver fails to load when the stealth package is used.

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jairaencio profile image
Jaira Encio • • Edited

does the error only occur when you add selenium-stealth library? Upon checking I noticed that others are experiencing issue in their local machines just by using stealth. You could try adding options.add_argument("--disable-blink-features=AutomationControlled") . Then try if it works both on your local and lambda.

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awolad profile image
Awolad Hossain •

Yes.

With the selenium-stealth default options like following:

options = Options()
options.binary_location = '/opt/headless-chromium'
options = webdriver.ChromeOptions()
options.add_argument("start-maximized")
# options.add_argument("--headless")
options.add_experimental_option("excludeSwitches", ["enable-automation"])
options.add_experimental_option('useAutomationExtension', False)

driver = webdriver.Chrome('/opt/chromedriver', chrome_options=options)

stealth(driver,
        languages=["en-US", "en"],
        vendor="Google Inc.",
        platform="Win32",
        webgl_vendor="Intel Inc.",
        renderer="Intel Iris OpenGL Engine",
        fix_hairline=True,
        )
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I'm getting error: Message: unknown error: Chrome failed to start: exited abnormally\n (Driver info: .....

By using this post options like following:

options = Options()
options.binary_location = '/opt/headless-chromium'
options.add_argument('--headless')
options.add_argument('--no-sandbox')
options.add_argument('--single-process')
options.add_argument('--disable-dev-shm-usage')

driver = webdriver.Chrome('/opt/chromedriver', chrome_options=options)

stealth(driver,
     languages=["en-US", "en"],
     vendor="Google Inc.",
      platform="Win32",
      webgl_vendor="Intel Inc.",
      renderer="Intel Iris OpenGL Engine",
       fix_hairline=True,
)
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I'm getting error: "'WebDriver' object has no attribute 'execute_cdp_cmd'"

Thread Thread
 
jairaencio profile image
Jaira Encio •

I'm seeing this article related to "execute_cdp_cmd" error. Apparently they used pip install --pre selenium to be able to execute CDP commands github.com/SeleniumHQ/selenium/iss...

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awolad profile image
Awolad Hossain •

I also tried that but not working. I forgot to mention that. It would be helpful for us if you try with the selenium-stealth package and update this post. Because some websites we can't scrape without the selenium-stealth package. Thanks!

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