🧑 Human-Like AI Tester

Test any application type — Web, CLI, Desktop GUI, Mobile, APIs, Conversational AI, File Ingestion — like an authentic human being: genuine typos, formatting quirks, rage-clicks, non-linear navigation, and mental-model mistakes that uncover real-world friction, silent failures, and validation flaws.

Zero runtime dependencies. Eight psychographic personas. One merged report.

30-second demo

pip install human-like-ai-tester
human-tester demo        # self-contained mock app with intentional UX flaws

Prefer a tour? bash examples/quickstart.sh walks the whole engine in ~2 minutes, and examples/python_api_example.py shows library usage.

Why human-like testing?

Traditional testing verifies software used flawlessly. Real users:

• Don't read instructions — they skim headers and miss below-the-fold fields.
• Make physical typos — adjacent keys, omitted letters, finger bounces (teh).
• Format idiosyncratically — (555) 234-5678 in digit-only fields, $1,500.00 in numeric price fields.
• Get impatient — rage-clicking buttons after ~1.5s of silence, risking double submissions.
• Navigate non-linearly — Back buttons, Escape, backdrop clicks, mid-flow abandonment.
• Think differently than your schema — string "25" instead of int 25, unquoted CLI paths with spaces, mind-changing mid-sentence in chatbots.
• Trust autocorrect and voice dictation — silently rewritten words — and read dates/numbers through their own locale (12/05/2026 is Dec 5 in the US, 12 May in Europe).

Install

pip install human-like-ai-tester        # from PyPI
# or from source:
git clone <your-fork> && cd human-like-ai-tester
pip install -e .[dev]                   # dev extras: ruff, build, twine, coverage

Requires Python 3.9+. The runtime package has zero mandatory dependencies.

Quickstart

human-tester personas                  # list the 8 simulation personas
human-tester simulate "Lets meet tomorrow" --voice --autocorrect --phonetic
human-tester test-web http://localhost:3000 --form-endpoint /submit
human-tester audit http://localhost:3000 --form-endpoint /submit \
  --endpoint /api/orders -o audit.md --json-output audit.json

The 7 program paradigms

Paradigm	Targets	Human behaviors simulated
Web & SPAs	Portals, eCommerce, SaaS	Double-clicks on slow submits, phone/address quirks, state loss on errors, Back-button reliance
CLI & Terminal	Shell tools, dev CLIs	Flag typos (--hlpe), unquoted spaces, bare Enter, colloquial answers (yeah)
Desktop GUI	Electron, Qt, native	Misclicks from button proximity, resize breakage, cancelled dialogs
Mobile & Touch	iOS, Android, responsive	Thumb reach, keyboard-covered submits, rage-taps, orientation flips
APIs & Services	REST, GraphQL, webhooks	String-vs-int types, trailing slashes, missing Bearer , extra fields
Conversational AI	Chatbots, agents, voice	Vague complaints, mid-sentence reversals, slang, premature sends
Data Ingestion	CSV/TSV/JSON pipelines	Excel BOM, mixed delimiters, blank rows, unescaped commas

Cross-cutting every paradigm: Accessibility (keyboard-only, screen reader) and i18n/Locale (date/decimal ambiguity, accented/CJK/RTL text).

Personas

ID	Persona	Signature behavior
rushed_commuter	Alex, Rushed Commuter	28% typos, 1.8s patience, rage-taps
tech_novice	Margaret, Senior / Tech Novice	65% formatting errors, Back-button reliant
cynical_power_user	David, Power User	110 WPM keyboard-only, boundary values
fatigued_worker	Sam, Fatigued Data Clerk	Transpositions, below-the-fold misses
curious_explorer	Elena, Explorer	Emojis, accented chars, window resizing
accessibility_navigator	Priya, A11y Navigator	Keyboard + screen reader, focus traps
non_native_speaker	Mateo, ESL User	Locale confusion, phonetic spelling
impatient_teen	Zoe, Impatient Teen	Autocorrect reliance, 1.0s patience, back-swipes

CLI reference

Command	Purpose
personas	List personas
simulate TEXT	Humanize text (--voice --autocorrect --phonetic --clipboard)
test-web URL	Page load, form formatting, double-submit, state loss
test-cli CMD	Help discovery, flag typos, paths, Ctrl-C, whitespace
test-api URL	Slashes, type coercion, booleans, pagination, webhooks, GraphQL
test-chat	Generate human/voice prompts, evaluate assistant replies
test-desktop APP	Button proximity, resize clipping, dialogs, shortcuts, drag-drop
test-mobile APP	Thumb reach, keyboard overlap, rotation, deep links, permissions
generate-file	Messy CSV/TSV/JSON fixtures for ingestion tests
validate-file PATH	Audit a real CSV for ingestion traps (exit 2 if unreadable)
audit URL	Multi-persona web+API sweep, one deduplicated report (-o, --json-output)
demo	Live end-to-end run against the built-in flawed mock app

Every command supports --persona ID (and --help). Run human-tester --version to print the version.

Python API

from human_tester import TypoEngine, get_persona

persona = get_persona("rushed_commuter")
typos = TypoEngine(seed=42)
print(typos.introduce_typos("Lets plan a meeting", error_rate=persona.typo_rate))
print(typos.format_phone_human_style("5551234567"))

See examples/python_api_example.py for the full tour (personas, cognition, chat vectors, file audits, reports), and examples/sample_audit_report.md for an annotated report.

Agent skill

SKILL.md is the agent-skill definition: behavioral protocol, severity rubric, frustration guide, and session workflow for AI agents that test as humans. Keep it in sync with CLI changes.

Project architecture

human-like-ai-tester/
├── SKILL.md                  # Agent skill definition (behavioral protocol)
├── README.md                 # This file
├── pyproject.toml            # Package metadata (version lives in human_tester/__init__.py)
├── LICENSE                   # MIT
├── CONTRIBUTING.md           # Setup, checks, PR rules
├── CHANGELOG.md              # Release history
├── human_tester/
│   ├── __init__.py           # Public API + __version__
│   ├── __main__.py           # `python -m human_tester` shortcut
│   ├── cli.py                # 12-command CLI
│   ├── personas.py           # 8 psychographic profiles
│   ├── typo_engine.py        # Typos, autocorrect, voice, phonetic, locale formats
│   ├── cognitive_engine.py   # Reading, hesitation, frustration, rage clicks
│   ├── error_patterns.py     # Formatting variants + a11y/i18n/mobile/API vectors
│   ├── reporter.py           # Markdown + JSON audit reports
│   ├── agent_prompts.py      # LLM prompts for agentic human testing
│   ├── mock_target_app.py    # Flawed demo app for `demo`
│   └── paradigms/            # web, cli, api, chat, file, desktop, mobile testers
├── examples/
│   ├── quickstart.sh         # 2-minute guided tour
│   ├── python_api_example.py # Library usage (network-free)
│   ├── sample_audit_report.md
│   └── manual_desktop_mobile_script.md
├── tests/                    # unittest suite (core, enrichment, CLI stability)
└── .github/                  # CI (3.9–3.13, ruff, build) + issue/PR templates

Tests

python -m unittest discover -s tests   # 71 tests, network-free, ~10s
python -m ruff check human_tester tests # lint gate

Contributing

Contributions welcome — new personas, behaviors, and paradigms especially. Please read CONTRIBUTING.md first. The short version: keep the CLI backward compatible, keep runtime dependencies at zero, and add a test with every behavior change.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.