KassiOS: a Kaspresso-style layer for XCUITest, tested against a broken bank

Description and use

KassiOS is a Kaspresso‑style layer over XCUITest that centralises waiting, retries, and reporting, validated against a deliberately buggy iOS app.

Problem

XCUITest lacks built‑in waiting, retries, screen objects and reporting, leading to fragile tests.

Outcome

KassiOS reduced test code verbosity, centralized waiting logic, and uncovered hidden defects in both the app and the framework itself when run against ChaosBank.

Workflow

• 1. Define screen objects as subclasses of KassScreen with lazy elements and onLoad arrays.
• 2. Write tests using onScreen blocks that perform actions and assertions.
• 3. KassiOS automatically waits for elements, retries within a time budget, scrolls, dismisses keyboard, and verifies state changes.
• 4. On failure, KassiOS captures a screenshot, accessibility tree, and a helpful message.
• 5. Run tests against ChaosBank, a deliberately buggy app, to validate defect detection.

Evidence

XCUITest gives you primitives and leaves waiting, retries, screen objects and reporting to you.

Source

KassiOS checks the elements in onLoad. If the app ended up on a different screen, the test fails right there, in the "On LoginScreen" step, instead of on whichever field it happened to touch first.

Source

When something does fail, the report gets a screenshot of the screen at that moment and the full accessibility tree, and the message tries to say why: KassiOS: text 'welcom' — assertVisible failed: does not exist ↳ element not found in the current hierarchy ↳ did you mean: 'welcome', 'Welcome!'?

Source

The first full run had 34 tests (Xcode 27.1, iPhone 17 simulator, M1 Max), and it was humbling: test_portfolio_showsTotalAndPnl stayed green with every defect on, including one that shows a loss as a gain.

Source