The term ‘unit test’ was being thrown about today at work but so many things about its context were just plain wrong. Just because our testing framework is called xUnit and each method happens to be called testX doesn\u00ef\u00bf\u00bdt make it a unit test. People have spent (far too much) time attempting to classify all types of tests coming up with categories like functional, acceptance, integration, or unit-integration tests. In my humble opinion, I tend to think of all tests falling along a spectrum, with unit tests (those that test just enough) on one end and the functional\/acceptance tests (those that test too much) on the other. <\/p>\n
Each test along this spectrum is important but the speed and quality of these tests will be one of the factors that determine how fast you can change or add to your code base. By all means, slower, bigger tests further along in the spectrum can be substituted for faster, lighter unit tests, but its consequences usually lead to a project that is less agile and more waterfall-driven.<\/p>\n
Here are a few signs that your tests may be masquerading as something more than just (better, and faster) unit tests:<\/p>\n
The term ‘unit test’ was being thrown about today at work but so many things about its context were just plain wrong. Just because our testing framework is called xUnit and each method happens to be called testX doesn\u00ef\u00bf\u00bdt make it a unit test. People have spent (far too much) time attempting to classify all […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[39],"class_list":["post-61","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technical","tag-work-related"],"yoast_head":"\n