Testing with Ruby

Testing with Ruby is often done with RSpec, but Minitest is the default testing library. Functionality wise, both can do the same things but Minitest has a more straight forward (Ruby-like) syntax while RSpec is closer to natural English. Rspec is a Domain Specific Language (DSL).

Vocabulary of Testing

  • Test Suite: the entire set of test for a program.
  • Test: the situation or context in which tests are run. A test can contain multiple assertions.
  • Assertion: the actual verification step; what is done to confirm that the data returned is what was expected.

Autopsy of a Test File

Assuming a Flamingo class with an instance variable wings which points to integer object 2, we can write the following test: 

require 'minitest/autorun'          # loads files from `minitest` gem

require_relative 'flamingo'         # name of the file we're testing
                                    # `require_relative` means from the
                                    # current file's directory

class FlamingoTest < MiniTest::Test # need to be a subclass of
                                    # `MiniTest::Test` to inherit test
                                    # methods
  def test_wings                    # each test has its own instance method
                                    # that starts with `test_`
    flamingo = Flamingo.new
    assert_equal(2, flamingo.wings) # the actual assertion
  end
end

Test Output

On our above file, the output would be something like this: 

Run options: --seed 57527

# Running:

.

Finished in 0.000684s, 1461.4371 runs/s, 1461.4371 assertions/s.

1 runs, 1 assertions, 0 failures, 0 errors, 0 skips

The dot . represents one successfully ran test. When skipped or failed, this dot became a S or a F, respectively.

seed tells the order the tests were run in. With multiple tests run in random order, having a seed can help reproduce a bug which only happens when tests are run in a particular order. To rerun the test in the same order, we can append --seed 57527 to our command.

Assertions

The example above used a straight forward assertion: the one for equality. There are other type of assertion, actually too much to list them all. They can be seen on this page.

The most common ones are written below:

  • assert(test): test for truthiness
  • assert_equal(exp, act): test for equality of exp and act
  • assert_nil(obj): test for nil
  • assert_raises(*exp) { ... }: test for block raise of *exp
  • assert_instance_of(cls, obj): test for instance of class cls
  • assert_includes(collection, obj): test for inclusion of obj in collection

Most assert (and refute, see below) methods accept a message argument, with an exception for assert_mock, assert_raises and assert_silent.

Refutations

Refutation are the opposite of assertions: they refute instead of assert. So for example, refute(test) check for falsiness, refute_nil test for not nil etc.

Setup and Teardown

To perform or run actions before or after each test, Minitest provides both setup and teardown methods. Each class that defines a test suite can have those two methods.

See also the SEAT Approach.

setup is often used to perform setup and requirements before each test. teardown is called for any required cleanup. This is often use to connect/disconnect to a database, for example.

Both methods are optional and independent: we can have both, neither or one of the two. 

class DatabaseTest < Minitest::Test
  def setup
    @myapp = MyApp.new
  end

  def test_something
    # perform some test
  end

  def test_something_else
    # perform some test
  end

  def teardown
    @myapp.cleanup
  end
end

Prior to test_something and test_something_else, setup creates a @myapp instance variable. After each test, teardown calls @myapp.cleanup which does whatever is useful for MyApp class.

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