Best Practice: Use Environment Variables for Authentication Credentials

As a best practice, we recommend setting your Sauce Labs authentication credentials as environment variables on your local system, that can then be referenced from within your tests. This provides an extra layer of security for your tests, and also enables other members of your development and testing team to write tests that will authenticate against a single account.

What You'll Need

The SAUCE_USERNAME and SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY specific to your Sauce Labs account. You can find them by logging into saucelabs.com and going to Account > User Settings.

Setting Up Environment Variables on macOS and Linux Systems

In Terminal mode, enter vi ~/.bash_profile, and then press Enter.
Press i to insert text into your profile file.

Enter these lines:

export SAUCE_USERNAME="your Sauce username"
export SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY="your Sauce access key"

Press Escape.
Hold Shift and press Z twice (z z) to save your file and quit vi.
In the terminal, enter source ~/.bash_profile.

Setting Up Environment Variables on Windows Systems

Click Start on the task bar.
For Search programs and fields, enter Environment Variables.
Click Edit the environment variables.
This will open the System Properties dialog.
Click Environment Variables.
This will open the Environment Variables dialog.
In the User variables section, click New.
This will open the New System Variable dialog.
For Variable name, enter SAUCE_USERNAME.
For Variable value, enter your Sauce username.
Click OK.
Repeat 4 - 8 to set up the SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY.

Referencing Environment Variables in Test Scripts

Once you've set up the environment variables for your credentials, you need to reference them within the test scripts that you want to run on Sauce. You can find examples of test scripts that use environment variables for authentication in the demo directory for each language in the Sauce Labs Training repo on GitHub.

Below are examples of how to set environment variables in a given language/framework:

String sauceUserName = System.getenv("SAUCE_USERNAME");
String sauceAccessKey = System.getenv("SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY");

Click here to view the full example

Module2JunitTest.java (source from Sauce Labs Training Java)

import org.junit.jupiter.api.AfterEach;
import org.junit.jupiter.api.Test;
import org.openqa.selenium.JavascriptExecutor;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.remote.DesiredCapabilities;
import org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebDriver;

import java.net.MalformedURLException;
import java.net.URL;

import static org.junit.jupiter.api.Assertions.*;

public class Module2JunitTest {
    private WebDriver driver;

    @Test
    public void shouldOpenSafari() throws MalformedURLException {
        /** Here we set environment variables from your local machine, or IntelliJ run configuration,
         *  and store these values in the variables below. Doing this is a best practice in terms of test execution
         *  and security. If you're not sure how to use env variables, refer to this guide -
         * https://wiki.saucelabs.com/display/DOCS/Best+Practice%3A+Use+Environment+Variables+for+Authentication+Credentials
         * or check junit5-README.md */
        String sauceUserName = System.getenv("SAUCE_USERNAME");
        String sauceAccessKey = System.getenv("SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY");
        String sauceURL = "https://ondemand.saucelabs.com/wd/hub";

        /**
         * In this section, we will configure our test to run on some specific
         * browser/os combination in Sauce Labs.*/
        DesiredCapabilities capabilities = new DesiredCapabilities();
        capabilities.setCapability("username", sauceUserName);
        capabilities.setCapability("accessKey", sauceAccessKey);
        capabilities.setCapability("browserName", "Safari");
        capabilities.setCapability("platform", "macOS 10.13");
        capabilities.setCapability("version", "11.1");
        capabilities.setCapability("build", "Onboarding Sample App - Java-Junit5");
        capabilities.setCapability("name", "2-user-site");

        /**
         * In this section, we set the Remote WebDriver to run on Sauce Labs, and pass the capabilities.
         * Then we perform some actions on an application.
         * For this script, enter in your application's URL in place of 'https://www.saucedemo.com'. */

        /** If you're accessing the EU data center, use the following endpoint:.
         * https://ondemand.eu-central-1.saucelabs.com/wd/hub
         * */
        driver = new RemoteWebDriver(new URL(sauceURL), capabilities);
        driver.navigate().to("https://www.saucedemo.com");
        //assertTrue(true);
    }

    /**
     * Below we are performing 2 critical actions. Quitting the driver and passing
     * the test result to Sauce Labs user interface.
     */
    @AfterEach
    public void cleanUpAfterTestMethod () {
        ((JavascriptExecutor) driver).executeScript("sauce:job-result=" + ("passed"));
        driver.quit();
    }
}

String sauceUserName = System.getenv("SAUCE_USERNAME");
String sauceAccessKey = System.getenv("SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY");

Click here to view the full example

Module2TestNGTest.java (source from Sauce Labs Training Java)

import org.openqa.selenium.JavascriptExecutor;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.remote.DesiredCapabilities;
import org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebDriver;
import org.testng.Assert;
import org.testng.ITestResult;
import org.testng.annotations.AfterMethod;
import org.testng.annotations.Test;

import java.lang.reflect.Method;
import java.net.MalformedURLException;
import java.net.URL;

public class Module2TestNGTest {

    private WebDriver driver;

    @Test
    public void shouldOpenSafari() throws MalformedURLException {
        /** Here we set environment variables from your local machine, or IntelliJ run configuration,
         *  and store these values in the variables below. Doing this is a best practice in terms of test execution
         *  and security. If you're not sure how to use env variables, refer to this guide -
         * https://wiki.saucelabs.com/display/DOCS/Best+Practice%3A+Use+Environment+Variables+for+Authentication+Credentials
         * or check testng-README.md */

        String sauceUserName = System.getenv("SAUCE_USERNAME");
        String sauceAccessKey = System.getenv("SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY");
        String sauceURL = "https://ondemand.saucelabs.com/wd/hub";

        /**
         * In this section, we will configure our test to run on some specific
         * browser/os combination in Sauce Labs.*/
        DesiredCapabilities capabilities = new DesiredCapabilities();
        capabilities.setCapability("username", sauceUserName);
        capabilities.setCapability("accessKey", sauceAccessKey);
        capabilities.setCapability("browserName", "Safari");
        capabilities.setCapability("platform", "macOS 10.13");
        capabilities.setCapability("version", "11.1");
        capabilities.setCapability("build", "Onboarding Sample App - Java-TestNG");
        capabilities.setCapability("name", "2-user-site");

        /**
         * In this section, we set the Remote WebDriver to run on Sauce Labs, and pass the capabilities.
         * Then we perform some actions on an application.
         * For this script, enter in your application's URL in place of 'https://www.saucedemo.com'. */

        /** If you're accessing the EU data center, use the following endpoint:.
         * https://ondemand.eu-central-1.saucelabs.com/wd/hub
         * */
        driver = new RemoteWebDriver(new URL(sauceURL), capabilities);
        driver.navigate().to("https://www.saucedemo.com");
        Assert.assertTrue(true);


    }
    /**
     * Below we are performing 2 critical actions. Quitting the driver and passing
     * the test result to Sauce Labs user interface. */
    @AfterMethod
    public void cleanUpAfterTestMethod(ITestResult result) {
        ((JavascriptExecutor)driver).executeScript("sauce:job-result=" + (result.isSuccess() ? "passed" : "failed"));
        driver.quit();
    }
}

var sauceUserName =
    Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("SAUCE_USERNAME", EnvironmentVariableTarget.User);      
var sauceAccessKey =
    Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY", EnvironmentVariableTarget.User);

Click here to view the full example

InstantSauceTest2.cs (source from Sauce Labs Training C#)

using System;
using System.Threading;
using NUnit.Framework;
using NUnit.Framework.Interfaces;
using OpenQA.Selenium;
using OpenQA.Selenium.Remote;

namespace Selenium3.Nunit.Scripts.OnboardingTests
{
    [TestFixture]
    [Category("InstantSauceTest"), Category("NUnit"), Category("Instant")]
    public class InstantSauceTest2
    {
        private IWebDriver _driver;
        [Test]
        public void ShouldOpenOnSafari()
        {
            /*
             * Best Practice
             * Instead of using hardcoded username and access key, you should store
             * the credentials in environment variables on your system. Not sure how to do this?
             * This document will help:
             * https://wiki.saucelabs.com/display/DOCS/Best+Practice%3A+Use+Environment+Variables+for+Authentication+Credentials
             */
            var sauceUserName =
                Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("SAUCE_USERNAME", EnvironmentVariableTarget.User);
            var sauceAccessKey =
                Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY", EnvironmentVariableTarget.User);

            /*
             * In this section, we will configure our test to run on some specific
             * browser/os combination in Sauce Labs
             */
            var capabilities = new DesiredCapabilities();
            capabilities.SetCapability("username", sauceUserName);
            capabilities.SetCapability("accessKey", sauceAccessKey);
            capabilities.SetCapability("browserName", "Safari");
            capabilities.SetCapability("platform", "macOS 10.13");
            capabilities.SetCapability("version", "11.1");
            capabilities.SetCapability("name", TestContext.CurrentContext.Test.Name);
            _driver = new RemoteWebDriver(new Uri("http://ondemand.saucelabs.com:80/wd/hub"),
                capabilities, TimeSpan.FromSeconds(600));

            //TODO Please supply your publicly available web url in place of saucedemo.com
            //In the future, you will learn how to access private URLs
            _driver.Navigate().GoToUrl("https://www.saucedemo.com");

            //Hardcoded sleep just for demonstration purposes
            Thread.Sleep(10000);
            //This test will always pass for demonstration purposes
            Assert.IsTrue(true);
        }

        /*
         *Below we are performing 2 critical actions. Quitting the driver and passing
         * the test result to Sauce Labs user interface.
         */
        [TearDown]
        public void CleanUpAfterEveryTestMethod()
        {
            var passed = TestContext.CurrentContext.Result.Outcome.Status == TestStatus.Passed;
            ((IJavaScriptExecutor)_driver).ExecuteScript("sauce:job-result=" + (passed ? "passed" : "failed"));
            _driver?.Quit();
        }
    }
}

let username = process.env.SAUCE_USERNAME,
    accessKey = process.env.SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY,

Click here to view the full example

wdio.saucelabs.conf.js (source from Sauce Labs Training JavaScript)

const {config} = require('./wdio.shared.conf');
const defaultBrowserSauceOptions = {
    build: `Best Practices: Sauce Labs Desktop Web build-${new Date().getTime()}`,
    screenResolution: '1600x1200',
};

// =====================
// Sauce specific config
// =====================
config.user = process.env.SAUCE_USERNAME;
config.key = process.env.SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY;
// If you run your tests on Sauce Labs you can specify the region you want to run your tests
// in via the `region` property. Available short handles for regions are `us` (default) and `eu`.
// These regions are used for the Sauce Labs VM cloud and the Sauce Labs Real Device Cloud.
// If you don't provide the region, it defaults to `us`.
config.region = process.env.REGION || 'us';

// ============
// Capabilities
// ============
config.capabilities = [
    /**
     * Desktop browsers
     */
    {
        browserName: 'googlechrome',
        platformName: 'Windows 10',
        browserVersion: 'latest',
        'sauce:options': {
            ...defaultBrowserSauceOptions,
        },
    },
    {
        browserName: 'firefox',
        platformName: 'Windows 10',
        browserVersion: 'latest',
        'sauce:options': {
            ...defaultBrowserSauceOptions,
        },
    },
    {
        browserName: 'internet explorer',
        platformName: 'Windows 8.1',
        browserVersion: 'latest',
        'sauce:options': {
            ...defaultBrowserSauceOptions,
        },
    },
    {
        browserName: 'MicrosoftEdge',
        platformName: 'Windows 10',
        browserVersion: '18.17763',
        'sauce:options': {
            ...defaultBrowserSauceOptions,
        },
    },
    {
        browserName: 'MicrosoftEdge',
        platformName: 'Windows 10',
        browserVersion: 'latest',
        'sauce:options': {
            ...defaultBrowserSauceOptions,
        },
    },
    // Safari 11 is not W3C compliant,
    // see https://developer.apple.com/documentation/webkit/macos_webdriver_commands_for_safari_11_1_and_earlier
    {
        browserName: 'safari',
        platform: 'macOS 10.13',
        version: '11.1',
        ...defaultBrowserSauceOptions,
    },
    // Safari 13
    {
        browserName: 'safari',
        platformName: 'macOS 10.15',
        browserVersion: 'latest',
        'sauce:options': {
            ...defaultBrowserSauceOptions,
        },
    },
    // Safari 12
    {
        browserName: 'safari',
        platformName: 'macOS 10.14',
        browserVersion: 'latest',
        'sauce:options': {
            ...defaultBrowserSauceOptions,
        },
    }
];

// ========
// Services
// ========
config.services = config.services.concat('sauce');

exports.config = config;

exports.config = {
	sauceUser: process.env.SAUCE_USERNAME,
	sauceKey: process.env.SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY,

Click here to expand...

protractor.saucelabs.conf.js (source from Sauce Labs Training JavaScript)

const { config } = require('./protractor.shared.conf');
const DEFAULT_CAPABILITIES = {
	/**
	 * Maximum number of browser instances that can run in parallel for this
	 * set of capabilities. This is only needed if shardTestFiles is true.
	 * Default is 1.
	 */
	maxInstances: 10,
	/**
	 * If this is set to be true, specs will be sharded by file (i.e. all
	 * files to be run by this set of capabilities will run in parallel).
	 * Default is false.
	 */
	shardTestFiles: true,
	screenResolution: '1600x1200',
};

// ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
// ----- To use remote browsers via Sauce Labs -------------------------------
// ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
config.sauceUser = process.env.SAUCE_USERNAME;
config.sauceKey = process.env.SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY;
/**
 * If you run your tests on SauceLabs you can specify the region you want to run your tests
 * in via the `sauceRegion` property. Available short handles for regions are:
 * us: us-west-1 (default)
 * eu: eu-central-1
 */
config.sauceRegion = process.env.REGION || 'us';
/**
 * Use sauceBuild if you want to group test capabilities by a build ID
 */
config.sauceBuild = `Protractor build-${process.env.DATE}`;

/**
 * If you would like to run more than one instance of WebDriver on the same
 * tests, use multiCapabilities, which takes an array of capabilities.
 * If this is specified, capabilities will be ignored.
 */
config.multiCapabilities = [
	{
		browserName: 'chrome',
		platform: 'Windows 10',
		version: 'latest',
		...DEFAULT_CAPABILITIES,
	},
	{
		browserName: 'firefox',
		platform: 'Windows 10',
		version: 'latest',
		...DEFAULT_CAPABILITIES,
	},
	{
		browserName: 'internet explorer',
		platform: 'Windows 8.1',
		version: 'latest',
		...DEFAULT_CAPABILITIES,
	},
	{
		browserName: 'MicrosoftEdge',
		platform: 'Windows 10',
		version: 'latest',
		...DEFAULT_CAPABILITIES,
	},
];

exports.config = config;

username: ENV['SAUCE_USERNAME'],
accessKey: ENV['SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY']

Click here to view the full example

module2_rspec_spec.rb (source from Sauce Labs Training Ruby)

require 'selenium-webdriver'
require 'rspec'

=begin
    The basic structure of RSpec uses 'describe' and 'it' to format our script in a conversational tone.
    'describe' represents the highest context, for example if we were testing authentication features it would say something like: '.authentication', and the 'it' would say something like 'should login'
=end
describe "Instant_RSpec_Test2" do
=begin
  'it' represents the business-level logic that we're testing,
  in this case we're checking to see if our test in SauceLabs session can open Chrome using W3C, then check the title page.
=end
  it "should_open_safari" do |test|

    caps = {
        # the caps object allows us to pass test metadata to the VM such as:
        # broswer_name, platform_version, browser_version, etc.
        browser_name: 'Safari',
        platform_version: 'macOS 10.13',
        browser_version: '11.1',
        # the sauce:options field allows us to define sauce labs-specific test parameters
        # such as: sauce username and access key, timeouts, selenium-examples version etc.
        "sauce:options" => {
            build: 'Onboarding Sample App - Ruby',
            name: '2-user-site',
            seleniumVersion: '3.141.59',
            username: ENV['SAUCE_USERNAME'],
            accessKey: ENV['SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY']
        }
    }
    driver = Selenium::WebDriver.for(:remote,
                                     url: 'https://ondemand.saucelabs.com:443/wd/hub',
                                     desired_capabilities: caps)
    driver.get('https://www.saucedemo.com')
    puts "title of webpage is: #{driver.title}"
    driver.quit
  end
end

sauce_username = os.environ["SAUCE_USERNAME"]
sauce_access_key = os.environ["SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY"]

Click here to view the full example

test_module2_pytest.py (source from Sauce Labs Training Python)

import pytest
from selenium import webdriver
import os
from _pytest.runner import runtestprotocol


@pytest.fixture
def driver(request):
    sauce_username = os.environ["SAUCE_USERNAME"]
    sauce_access_key = os.environ["SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY"]
    remote_url = "https://ondemand.saucelabs.com:443/wd/hub"

    desired_cap = {
        'platform': 'Mac OS X 10.13',
        'browserName': 'safari',
        'version': '11.1',
        'build': 'Onboarding Sample App - Python + Pytest',
        'name': '2-user-site',
        'username': sauce_username,
        'accessKey': sauce_access_key
    }

    browser = webdriver.Remote(command_executor=remote_url, desired_capabilities=desired_cap)
    yield browser
    browser.quit()


# Here is our actual test code. In this test we open the saucedemo app in chrome and assert that the title is correct.
def test_should_open_chrome(driver):
    # Substitute 'http://www.saucedemo.com' for your own application URL
    driver.get("https://www.saucedemo.com")
    actual_title = driver.title
    expected_title = "Swag Labs"
    assert expected_title == actual_title

sauce_username = os.environ["SAUCE_USERNAME"]
sauce_access_key = os.environ["SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY"]

Click here to view the full example

test_module2_unittest.py (source from Sauce Labs Training Python)

# Selenium 3.14+ doesn't enable certificate checking
import unittest
import os
from selenium import webdriver

sauce_username = os.environ["SAUCE_USERNAME"]
sauce_access_key = os.environ["SAUCE_ACCESS_KEY"]
remote_url = "https://ondemand.saucelabs.com:443/wd/hub"

class Module2Test(unittest.TestCase):

    def setUp(self):
        desired_cap = {
            'platform': 'Mac OS X 10.13',
            'browserName': 'safari',
            'version': "11.1",
            'build': 'Onboarding Sample App - Python + UnitTest',
            'name': '2-user-test',
            'username': sauce_username,
            'accessKey': sauce_access_key
        }
        self.driver = webdriver.Remote(command_executor=remote_url, desired_capabilities=desired_cap)

    def test_should_open_chrome(self):
        # Substitute 'http://www.saucedemo.com' for your own application URL
        self.driver.get("https://www.saucedemo.com")
        assert ("Swag Labs" in self.driver.title)

    def tearDown(self):
        if self.driver.title == 'Swag Labs':
            self.driver.execute_script('sauce:job-result=passed')
        else:
            self.driver.execute_script('sauce:job-result=failed')
        self.driver.quit()


if __name__ == '__main__':
    unittest.main()

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What You'll Need

Setting Up Environment Variables on macOS and Linux Systems

Setting Up Environment Variables on Windows Systems

Referencing Environment Variables in Test Scripts