Difference between “selenium server” and “selenium server standalone” jars

Question

Can anyone please explain the difference between \"selenium server\" and \"selenium server standalone\" jars and use of both.

Which one to prefer? When to use which

Answer 1

I believe that "selenium server" jar IS "selenium server standalone" jar. If you look at http://www.seleniumhq.org/download/ - there is not such thing as "selenium server".

Grid and RC servers are in the same jar file. RC ("Remote Control") is deprecated in Selenium 2 and emulated in Selenium 3.

Lazily, "selenium server standalone" can be called just "selenium server", because that's what it is: proxy to selenium grid or whatever remote browsers you want to automate. "standalone" is HTTP server.

http://www.protractortest.org/#/infrastructure hints at difference in terminology: it is "standalone" when running locally, and "server" when running (standalone jar) on remote grid (which is a http server assigning jobs to multiple selenium servers, each running "standalone" jars).