Automated Testing Lunch n Learn @incuna

What is it? • Unit tests • Integration tests • Functional/acceptance tests • Visual tests • Regression tests

Why? • Trust in the code • Freedom to refactor • Reduce number of bugs

What is it not? • A complete replacement for QA, a useful tool for doing QA • For content

Types of test

Unit tests • Test small specific pieces of functionality • Cover as many cases as possible • (Should be) quick and easy • Fragile but isolated • Mock out other layers • Coverage

Integration tests • Work across multiple layers of the program • Ensure all the individual pieces fit together • Simulate real requests • Test only “normal” things • Should break less often

Functional or Acceptance tests • Test the whole system • Test user stories • “Open up browser, go to home page, click on login link, fill in correct information, redirects to profile page, click on forum navigation, make a post, post appears on page...”

Functional or Acceptance tests • SLOW, and harder to write • More likely part of the QA process than the development process • Immensely useful for front end logic

Visual tests • Does this page look like this screenshot? • Cross browser • Needs research...

Regression testing

Regression tests • “AAAA this is broken we must fix it now” • “I’ll write a test for it” • A bug is not a bug, it’s a missing test • Makes sure the bug doesn’t come back

Regression tests • Could be any one of the other kinds of test • Never get written if the project didn’t have tests to start with

Continuous integration

Continuous integration • Runs test suite against changes and pull requests • Warns us if someone breaks things • Runs in a production-like setting

Test driven development

Test driven development • Write the tests first • Add code afterwards • (Refactor) • Check tests still pass • Repeat

Test driven development • Feels slower to start with • More reliable than “refreshing the page to see if it worked” • Requires good tools • Saves time (and face) in the long run

Live demo time!