MarketSquare / MarketSquare/robotframework-browser
No documentation for using Browser from Python without Robot Framework
Nobody has claimed this yet.
- Dominant language
- Python
- Stars
- 655
- Forks
- 147
- Avg merge
- 5h 27m
- Merged PRs (30d)
- 59
Description
Browser keywords can be called from a plain Python script with no Robot Framework run anywhere, and argument conversion makes this a supported way to use the library. There is no documentation for it.
Two behaviours are specific to this context, and both are already measured:
browser.outputdiris the current working directory.Browser/browser.py:829falls back toself._output_dirwhenEXECUTION_CONTEXTS.currentis empty, so screenshots, videos, traces and the Playwright log land wherever the script was started from.validateandthenraiseRobotNotRunningError: Cannot access execution context. All 31 keywords taking anAssertionOperatorstill accept and convert the operator — only these two operators' execution needs a Robot Framework run. This is pre-existing and outside the library's control.
Neither holds under Robot Framework. In particular they do not hold when a user's own library owns the Browser instance: Robot Framework is still running, so ${OUTPUTDIR} resolves and BuiltIn().evaluate works. Conflating "no Robot Framework" with "not imported by Robot Framework" is the mistake this issue exists to prevent.
Where it belongs
One closing section on /docs/extending/browser-as-a-base, once that page exists. The two pages covering the Robot Framework-hosted cases are specced in the site repository as docs/superpowers/specs/2026-08-16-python-extension-docs.md, and this case is explicitly out of scope there.
Parking it costs nothing today: the argument-conversion behaviour is documented by those two pages regardless, because it applies to any call reaching a keyword through attributes.
Contributor guide
First steps
- Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
- Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
- Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
- Open a pull request that references the issue number.
Research direction
Read Browser/browser.py:829 to confirm the output-directory fallback, then review docs/superpowers/specs/2026-08-16-python-extension-docs.md and the planned /docs/extending/browser-as-a-base page. Once that page exists, add a closing section covering plain Python usage, output location, and the validate/then limitation; done when the documented behavior matches the two measured cases.
Written by the indexing model from the issue text.
Assessment
- Tech stack
- playwright, python
- Domain
- documentation
- Issue type
- Documentation
- Difficulty
- 3/5
- Estimated time
- 1-2 days
- Activity status
- Quiet
- Clarity
- Mostly clear
- Newbie friendliness
- 55/100