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  5. AWS Device Farm vs Charles

AWS Device Farm vs Charles

OverviewComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Charles
Charles
Stacks140
Followers167
Votes0
AWS Device Farm
AWS Device Farm
Stacks74
Followers180
Votes5

AWS Device Farm vs Charles: What are the differences?

Introduction

AWS Device Farm and Charles are both tools used in software development, but they have some key differences.

  1. Intended Use: AWS Device Farm is primarily used for automated mobile app testing on real devices, providing a cloud-based platform for running tests on a large variety of devices. It offers automated and manual testing options, with support for different platforms and testing frameworks. On the other hand, Charles is a web debugging proxy that allows developers to inspect and analyze network traffic between their applications and the internet. It is commonly used for debugging and testing web applications.

  2. Platform Support: AWS Device Farm supports a wide range of mobile platforms, including Android, iOS, and FireOS. It also supports various testing frameworks like Appium, Calabash, and Espresso. In contrast, Charles is platform-agnostic and can be used with any web application running on different platforms and devices. It works at the network level, capturing HTTP/HTTPS requests and responses.

  3. Testing Capabilities: AWS Device Farm provides comprehensive testing capabilities for mobile app testing, including functional testing, performance testing, and compatibility testing. It offers features like remote access to real devices, test automation, crash reporting, and performance analytics. Charles, on the other hand, focuses on network-level testing and debugging. It allows users to intercept and manipulate network requests, simulate different network conditions, and analyze network traffic for debugging purposes.

  4. Deployment Method: AWS Device Farm is a cloud-based service provided by Amazon Web Services (AWS). It allows users to upload their mobile app package and run tests on a wide range of real devices hosted in the cloud. In contrast, Charles is a standalone desktop application that needs to be installed on the developer's machine. It acts as a proxy server, allowing developers to route their network traffic through Charles for inspection and analysis.

  5. Pricing Model: AWS Device Farm follows a pay-per-use pricing model, where users are charged based on the duration and number of devices used for testing. The pricing is tiered based on device minutes and parallel test executions. On the other hand, Charles follows a one-time payment model, where users purchase a license for the software. There are no additional charges for using Charles once the license is obtained.

  6. User Interface: AWS Device Farm provides a web-based user interface (UI) for managing tests, devices, and test results. It offers a user-friendly interface with various features for organizing and analyzing test results. Charles, on the other hand, has a desktop application UI with a more technical and developer-oriented interface. It provides detailed information about network requests, response headers, and SSL certificates.

In summary, AWS Device Farm is a cloud-based platform for mobile app testing, focusing on automated and manual testing on real devices. It supports various testing frameworks and provides comprehensive testing capabilities. Charles, on the other hand, is a web debugging proxy tool that allows developers to intercept and analyze network traffic between their applications and the internet. It is primarily used for web application debugging and network-level testing.

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Detailed Comparison

Charles
Charles
AWS Device Farm
AWS Device Farm

Charles is a web proxy (HTTP Proxy / HTTP Monitor) that runs on your own computer. Your web browser (or any other Internet application) is then configured to access the Internet through Charles, and Charles is then able to record and display for you all of the data that is sent and received.

Run tests across a large selection of physical devices in parallel from various manufacturers with varying hardware, OS versions and form factors.

SSL Proxying – view SSL requests and responses in plain text;Bandwidth Throttling to simulate slower Internet connections including latency;AJAX debugging – view XML and JSON requests and responses as a tree or as text;AMF – view the contents of Flash Remoting / Flex Remoting messages as a tree;Repeat requests to test back-end changes;Edit requests to test different inputs;Breakpoints to intercept and edit requests or responses;Validate recorded HTML, CSS and RSS/atom responses using the W3C validator
Test on the same devices your customers use; Fix issues faster and delight your users; Simulate real-world environments; Choose the tests that work for you; Integrate with your development workflow; Test with confidence;
Statistics
Stacks
140
Stacks
74
Followers
167
Followers
180
Votes
0
Votes
5
Pros & Cons
No community feedback yet
Pros
  • 3
    1000 free minutes
  • 2
    Pay as you go pricing
Cons
  • 1
    You need to remember to turn airplane mode off
  • 1
    Records all sessions, blocks on processing when done

What are some alternatives to Charles, AWS Device Farm?

Postman

Postman

It is the only complete API development environment, used by nearly five million developers and more than 100,000 companies worldwide.

Paw

Paw

Paw is a full-featured and beautifully designed Mac app that makes interaction with REST services delightful. Either you are an API maker or consumer, Paw helps you build HTTP requests, inspect the server's response and even generate client code.

Karate DSL

Karate DSL

Combines API test-automation, mocks and performance-testing into a single, unified framework. The BDD syntax popularized by Cucumber is language-neutral, and easy for even non-programmers. Besides powerful JSON & XML assertions, you can run tests in parallel for speed - which is critical for HTTP API testing.

Appwrite

Appwrite

Appwrite's open-source platform lets you add Auth, DBs, Functions and Storage to your product and build any application at any scale, own your data, and use your preferred coding languages and tools.

Runscope

Runscope

Keep tabs on all aspects of your API's performance with uptime monitoring, integration testing, logging and real-time monitoring.

k6

k6

It is a developer centric open source load testing tool for testing the performance of your backend infrastructure. It’s built with Go and JavaScript to integrate well into your development workflow.

Locust

Locust

Locust is an easy-to-use, distributed, user load testing tool. Intended for load testing web sites (or other systems) and figuring out how many concurrent users a system can handle.

Insomnia REST Client

Insomnia REST Client

Insomnia is a powerful REST API Client with cookie management, environment variables, code generation, and authentication for Mac, Window, and Linux.

RAML

RAML

RESTful API Modeling Language (RAML) makes it easy to manage the whole API lifecycle from design to sharing. It's concise - you only write what you need to define - and reusable. It is machine readable API design that is actually human friendly.

Apigee

Apigee

API management, design, analytics, and security are at the heart of modern digital architecture. The Apigee intelligent API platform is a complete solution for moving business to the digital world.

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