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

Selenium is an opensource, web application automation testing tool suite which provides cross platform and cross browser automation facility.

Selenium is composed of multiple software tools that includes:- (1). Selenium IDE, (2). Selenium RC, (3). Selenium WebDriver, (4). Selenium Grid

Coming to the Selenium Server, The Selenium Server is a Selenium RC(Remote Control) component that which launches and kills browsers, interprets and runs the Selenese commands passed from the test program, and acts as an HTTP proxy, intercepting and verifying HTTP messages passed between the browser and the AUT(Application Under Test).

So, Selenium Server is needed to run Selenium RC and Selenium WebDriver tests remotely over multiple machines or VMs using Selenium Grid.

And the Selenium Server Standalone is a bundled jar that contains WebDriver API, Selenium Server and the Selenium Grid for running the tests locally and remotely across many platforms and browsers.