Smoke Test Runner Skill

Smoke Test Runner

Overview

Execute fast, high-confidence smoke tests that validate critical application functionality after deployment or build. Smoke tests verify that the application starts, core user flows work, and key integrations respond -- without running the full test suite.

Prerequisites

Application deployed and accessible at a known URL or running locally
HTTP client available (curl, wget, node-fetch, or Playwright)
List of critical endpoints and user flows to validate
Expected response codes and content patterns for each check
CI/CD pipeline hook for post-deployment validation

Instructions

Identify the critical paths that constitute a "working" application:
- Health check endpoint returns 200 with expected body.
- Homepage loads and contains key UI elements.
- Authentication flow succeeds with test credentials.
- Primary API endpoint returns valid data.
- Database connection is active and responding.
Create a smoke test configuration listing each check:
- URL or command to execute.
- Expected HTTP status code (200, 301, etc.).
- Response body pattern to match (substring or regex).
- Maximum acceptable response time (e.g., 3 seconds).
Write the smoke test suite as a lightweight script or test file:
- Use curl for HTTP checks or Playwright for browser-based checks.
- Run checks sequentially for simplicity (parallel for speed if independent).
- Fail fast on the first critical failure.
- Log each check result with pass/fail, response time, and status code.
Implement timeout guards:
- Set a global timeout of 60 seconds for the entire smoke suite.
- Set per-check timeouts of 5-10 seconds.
- Treat timeouts as failures, not retries.
Add deployment-gate integration:
- On success: proceed with deployment promotion or traffic shifting.
- On failure: trigger rollback and send alert notification.
- Report results to CI/CD dashboard and Slack/Teams webhook.
Store smoke test results as CI artifacts for audit trail.
Schedule periodic smoke runs (every 5 minutes in production) as synthetic monitoring.

Output

Smoke test script (scripts/smoke-test.sh or tests/smoke.test.ts)
Pass/fail result for each critical check with response times
Deployment gate verdict (PASS or FAIL with reason)
CI artifact with timestamped smoke test log
Alert payload for failed checks (Slack webhook, PagerDuty, etc.)

Error Handling

| Error | Cause | Solution | |-------|-------|---------| | Connection refused | Application not yet ready after deployment | Add a startup wait with exponential backoff (max 30 seconds) before running smoke tests | | 503 Service Unavailable | Application is starting or behind a load balancer draining | Retry with 2-second delay up to 3 times; check load balancer health check status | | Unexpected redirect (301/302) | URL changed or SSL redirect not accounted for | Follow redirects with curl -L; update expected URLs in smoke config | | Content mismatch | Page content changed but smoke test pattern is too specific | Use broad patterns (check for <title> or key element IDs, not exact text) | | Timeout on database check | Database migration running or connection pool exhausted | Increase timeout for database checks; verify migration completed before smoke tests |

Examples

Shell-based smoke test script:

#!/bin/bash
set -e
BASE_URL="${1:-http://localhost:3000}"  # 3000: 3 seconds in ms
PASS=0; FAIL=0

check() {
  local name="$1" url="$2" expected="$3"
  status=$(curl -s -o /dev/null -w '%{http_code}' --max-time 5 "$url")
  if [ "$status" = "$expected" ]; then
    echo "PASS: $name (HTTP $status)"
    ((PASS++))
  else
    echo "FAIL: $name (expected $expected, got $status)"
    ((FAIL++))
  fi
}

check "Health check" "$BASE_URL/health" "200"  # HTTP 200 OK
check "Homepage" "$BASE_URL/" "200"  # HTTP 200 OK
check "API status" "$BASE_URL/api/status" "200"  # HTTP 200 OK
check "Login page" "$BASE_URL/login" "200"  # HTTP 200 OK

echo "Results: $PASS passed, $FAIL failed"
[ "$FAIL" -eq 0 ] || exit 1

Playwright smoke test:

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test('homepage loads with navigation', async ({ page }) => {
  await page.goto('/', { timeout: 10000 });  # 10000: 10 seconds in ms
  await expect(page.locator('nav')).toBeVisible();
  await expect(page).toHaveTitle(/My App/);
});

test('API health endpoint responds', async ({ request }) => {
  const response = await request.get('/api/health');
  expect(response.ok()).toBeTruthy();
  expect(await response.json()).toHaveProperty('status', 'ok');
});

Resources

Smoke testing methodology: https://martinfowler.com/bliki/SmokeTest.html
Playwright API testing: https://playwright.dev/docs/api-testing
curl documentation: https://curl.se/docs/manpage.html
GitHub Actions deployment gates: https://docs.github.com/en/actions/deployment/targeting-different-environments/using-environments-for-deployment

Agent Skills: Smoke Test Runner

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