Re: unit test framework

[joakim@verona.se]

Lennart Borgman <lennart.borgman@gmail.com> writes:

> On Thu, Mar 18, 2010 at 3:22 PM, Stefan Monnier
> <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> wrote:
>>> Do you have a plan to include an elisp library for unit
>>> testing in Emacs-24?
>>
>> It's not in the current plan, but I'm in favor of adding such
>> a thing, yes.  I simply don't have the time and energy to delve much
>> into it.
>>
>>> I've tried some and I'm using ert.el written by Christian M. Ohler.
>>>      http://github.com/masatake/ert/blob/master/ert.el>
>> If other people can chime in on the various options and form
>> a consensus, that would be wonderful.
>
>
> I asked long ago for a comparision on EmacsWiki:
>
>   http://www.emacswiki.org/cgi-bin/wiki/UnitTesting
>
> However there have not been any interest in that. If have cc:ed the
> unit test framework authors, maybe they want to say something.
>
> I am not sure which of them have signed papers:
>
>   ert: Christian Ohler
>   elunit: Phil Hagelberg
>   elk-test: Nikolaj Schumacher
>   etest: Phil Jackson
>   el-mock: rubikitch
>
>
>>        Stefan
>>
>>
>> PS: One thing for which I'd like to be able to use such a test framework, is
>> to link tests<->bug numbers<->commits.

I write try to write unit tests for my elisp, and it would be much
easier if there was a canonical unit test framework in Emacs.

I have written some tests for CEDET, which doesnt really use a
framework, and should be included in Emacs(I havent looked at the merged
version yet). I have also written some tests in elunit for other
packages.

I'm currently writing some code that would benefit from simulation of
keyboard input, in particular code that uses read, read-number,
completing-read etc. Some of the contenders listed above surely does
this, right?

Anyway, maybe we should make a list of requirements for a unit test
package for inclusion. Heres my take:

- possibility to generate unit tests reports in test runs during "make"

- at least rudimentary user input simulation, to test read, read-number,
completing-read etc.

- some way of isolating test runs from normal operations

- good error reporting, so that you dont have to spend hours in edebug needlessly

- convenient way of defining and running tests, in group or one-by-one



-- 
Joakim Verona