VS2010 Coded UI Test - Test builder unable to map two checkboxes with same text - visual-studio-2010

Question

I'm trying to create a coded UI test (with VS2010 Ultimate) for a simple web form page with two checkboxes and a submit hyperlink. The checkboxes have the same text label; "I Agree".
Using the coded UI test builder to record actions, only one checkbox is captured because both checkboxes have the same text / same UIMap Name.
Using the crosshair tool to select the second checkbox, it replaces the previous checkbox instance because they have the same text / same UIMap Name.
When the test is run, the first checkbox is checked, the second is not, and the hyperlink is clicked to submitted the form (failing validation).
How can I add the second checkbox to the test map and differentiate between the two?

Answer 1

If there are no unique properties on the checkboxes themselves, specify the parent object of each checkbox to differentiate them.
Example:
For
<div id="box1Parent">
<input label="I Agree"/>
</div>
<div id=box2Parent">
<input label="I Agree"/>
</div>
You would define the object like this:
public HtmlCheckBox AgreementBox1()
{
HtmlDiv parent = new HtmlDiv(browser);
parent.SearchProperties["id"] = "box1Parent";
HtmlCheckBox target = new HtmlCheckBox(parent);
target.SearchProperties["label"] = "I Agree";
return target;
}
Then, do the same for the second box, but point the parent to box2Parent. This would be your code in the non-designer section of the .uitest class.

Answer 2

There are multiple ways to do this.
Try to find out unique property of object like id, name.
Try to find out parent control/container of checkbox, then use {TAB} or {UP}/{DOWN} keys.
Use {TAB} key of keyboard. find out previous control -> click on that control -> use {TAB} from that control to get focus on checkbox control and use {UP}/{DOWN} arrow key to navigate.
Find out text of document and click on first or second occurrence of that as per your need.
Code to find out document Text,
public string GetCurrentPageVisibleTexts()
{
var window = this.UIMap.<WindowObject>
UITestControlCollection c = window.GetChildren();
var pgContent = (string)c[0].GetProperty("OuterHtml");
var document = new HtmlAgilityPack.HtmlDocument();
document.LoadHtml(pgContent);
// We don't want these in our result
var exclusionText = new string[] { "<!--", "<![CDATA", "function()", "</form>" };
var visibleTexts = new List<string>();
//var nodes = document.DocumentNode.Descendants().Where(d => !d.Name.ToLower().Equals("span"));
foreach (var elem in document.DocumentNode.Descendants())
{
// Foreach element iterate its path back till root
// and look for "display: none" attribute in each one of its parent node
// to verify whether that element or any of its parent are marked as hidden
var tempElem = elem;
while (tempElem.ParentNode != null)
{
if (tempElem.Attributes["style"] != null)
{
// if hidden attribute found then break.
if (tempElem.Attributes["style"].Value.ToLower().Contains("display: none")) break;
}
tempElem = tempElem.ParentNode;
}
// If iteration reached to head and element is found clean of hidden property then proceed with text extraction.
if (tempElem.ParentNode == null)
{
if (!exclusionText.Any(e => elem.InnerText.Contains(e))
&& (!elem.InnerText.Trim().IsNullOrEmpty())
&& (!elem.HasChildNodes))
{
visibleTexts.Add(elem.InnerText);
}
}
} // Foreach close
var completeText = string.Join(" ", visibleTexts).Replace(" ", " ");
return Regex.Replace(completeText, #"\s+", " ");
}