/ 
Test-Most-0.01
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/ Test::Most

NAME

Test::Most - Most commonly needed test functions and features.

VERSION

Version 0.01

SYNOPSIS

WARNING: This is alpha code. It seems to work well, but use with caution.

This module provides you with the most commonly used testing functions and gives you a bit more fine-grained control over your test suite.

use Test::Most tests => 4, 'die';

ok 1, 'Normal calls to ok() should succeed';
is 2, 2, '... as should all passing tests';
eq_or_diff [3], [4], '... but failing tests should die';
ok 4, '... will never get to here';

As you can see, the eq_or_diff test will fail. Because 'die' is in the import list, the test program will halt at that point.

EXPORT

All functions from the following modules will automatically be exported into your namespace:

  • Test::More

  • Test::Exception

  • Test::Differences

  • Test::Deep

Functions which are optionally exported from any of those modules must be referred to by their fully-qualified name:

Test::Deep::render_stack( $var, $stack );

FUNCTIONS

Four other functions are also automatically exported:

die_on_fail

die_on_fail;
is_deeply $foo, bar, '... we die if this fails';

This function, if called, will cause the test program to die if any tests fail after it.

bail_on_fail

bail_on_fail;
is_deeply $foo, bar, '... we bail out if this fails';

This function, if called, will cause the test suite to BAIL_OUT() if any tests fail after it.

restore_fail

die_on_fail;
is_deeply $foo, bar, '... we die if this fails';

restore_fail;
cmp_bag(\@got, \@bag, '... we will not die if this fails';

This restores the original test failure behavior, so subsequent tests will no longer die or BAIL_OUT().

explain

Like diag(), but only outputs the message if $ENV{TEST_VERBOSE} is set. This is typically set by using the -v switch with prove.

Requires Test::Harness 3.07 or greater.

DIE OR BAIL ON FAIL

Sometimes you want your test suite to die or BAIL_OUT() if a test fails. In order to provide maximum flexibility, there are three ways to accomplish each of these.

Import list

use Test::Most 'die', tests => 7;
use Test::Most qw< no_plan bail >;

If die or bail is anywhere in the import list, the test program/suite will die or BAIL_OUT() as appropriate the first time a test fails. Calling restore_fail anywhere in the test program will restore the original behavior (not dieing or bailing out).

Functions

use Test::Most 'no_plan;
ok $bar, 'The test suite will continue if this passes';

die_on_fail;
is_deeply $foo, bar, '... we die if this fails';

restore_fail;
ok $baz, 'The test suite will continue if this passes';

The die_on_fail and bail_on_fail functions will automatically set the desired behavior at runtime.

Environment variables

DIE_ON_FAIL=1 prove t/
BAIL_ON_FAIL=1 prove t/

If the DIE_ON_FAIL or BAIL_ON_FAIL environment variables are true, any tests which use Test::Most will die or call BAIL_OUT on test failure.

RATIONALE

People want more control over their test suites. Sometimes when you see hundreds of tests failing and whizzing by, you want the test suite to simply halt on the first failure. This module gives you that control.

As for the reasons for the four test modules chosen, I ran code over a local copy of the CPAN to find the most commonly used testing modules. Here were the top ten (out of 287):

Test::More              44461
Test                     8937
Test::Exception          1379
Test::Simple              731
Test::Base                316
Test::Builder::Tester     193
Test::NoWarnings          174
Test::Differences         146
Test::MockObject          139
Test::Deep                127

The four modules chosen seemed the best fit for what Test::Most is trying to do.

AUTHOR

Curtis Poe, <ovid at cpan.org>

BUGS

Please report any bugs or feature requests to bug-test-extended at rt.cpan.org, or through the web interface at http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/ReportBug.html?Queue=Test-Most. I will be notified, and then you'll automatically be notified of progress on your bug as I make changes.

SUPPORT

You can find documentation for this module with the perldoc command.

perldoc Test::Most

You can also look for information at:

TODO

Deferred plans

Sometimes you don't know the number of tests you will run when you use Test::More. The plan() function allows you to delay specifying the plan, but you must still call it before the tests are run. This is an error:

use Test::More;

my $tests = 0;
foreach my $test (
    my $count = run($test); # assumes tests are being run
    $tests += $count;
}
plan($tests);

The way around this is typically to use 'no_plan' and when the tests are done, Test::Builder merely sets the plan to the number of tests run. We'd like for the programmer to specify this number instead of letting Test::Builder do it. However, Test::Builder internals are a bit difficult to work with, so we're delaying this feature.

Cleaner skip()

if ( $some_condition ) {
    skip $message, $num_tests;
}
else {
    # run those tests
}

That would be cleaner and I might add it if enough people want it.

CAVEATS

Because of how Perl handles arguments, and because diagnostics are not really part of the Test Anything Protocol, what actually happens internally is that we note that a test has failed and we die or bail out as soon as the next test is called (but before it runs). This means that its arguments are automatically evaulated before we can take action:

use Test::Most qw<no_plan die>;

ok $foo, 'Die if this fails';
ok factorial(123456), '... but wait a loooong time before you die';

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Many thanks to perl-qa for arguing about this so much that I just went ahead and did it :)

Thanks to Aristotle for suggesting a better way to die or bailout.

COPYRIGHT & LICENSE

Copyright 2008 Curtis Poe, all rights reserved.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.