Gherkin Syntax Highlighting in Chrome

Google Chrome is one of the most popular web browsers around. Recently, I discovered that Chrome can edit and display Gherkin feature files. The Chrome Web Store has two useful extensions for Gherkin: Tidy Gherkin and Pretty Gherkin, both developed by Martin Roddam. Together, these two extensions provide a convenient, lightweight way to handle feature files.

Tidy Gherkin

Tidy Gherkin is a Chrome app for editing and formatting feature files. Once it is installed, it can be reached from the Chrome Apps page (chrome://apps/). The editor appears in a separate window. Gherkin text is automatically colored as it is typed. The bottom preview pane automatically formats each line, and clicking the “TIDY!” button in the upper-left corner will format the user-entered text area as well. Feature files can be saved and opened like a regular text editor. Templates for Feature, Scenario, and Scenario Outline sections may be inserted, as well as tables, rows, and columns.

Another really nice feature of Tidy Gherkin is that the preview pane automatically generates step definition stubs for Java, Ruby, and JavaScript! The step def code is compatible with the Cucumber test frameworks. (The Java code uses the traditional step def format, not the Java 8 lambdas.) This feature is useful if you aren’t already using an IDE for automation development.

Tidy Gherkin has pros and cons when compared to other editors like Notepad++ and Atom. The main advantages are automatic formatting and step definition generation – features typically seen only in IDEs. It’s also convenient for users who already use Chrome, and it’s cross-platform. However, it lacks richer text editing features offered by other editors, it’s not extendable, and the step def gen feature may not be useful to all users. It also requires a bit of navigation to open files, whereas other editors may be a simple right-click away. Overall, Tidy Gherkin is nevertheless a nifty, niche editor.

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Pretty Gherkin

Pretty Gherkin is a Chrome extension for viewing Gherkin feature files through the browser with syntax highlighting. After installing it, make sure to enable the “Allow access to the file URLs” option on the Chrome Extensions page (chrome://extensions/). Then, whenever Chrome opens a feature file, it should display pretty text. For example, try the GoogleSearch.feature file from my Cucumber-JVM example project, cucumber-jvm-java-example. Unfortunately, though, I could not get Chrome to display local feature files – every time I would try to open one, Chrome would simply download it. Nevertheless, Pretty Gherkin seems to work for online SCM sites like GitHub and BitBucket.

Since Pretty Gherkin is simply a display tool, it can’t really be compared to other editors. I’d recommend Pretty Gherkin to Chrome users who often read feature files from online code repositories.

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Be sure to check out other Gherkin editors, too!