InfoQ Homepage Presentations Find the Right Abstraction Level for Your Tests
Find the Right Abstraction Level for Your Tests
Summary
Gerard Meszaros advises on using the right abstraction level and automation tools when creating unit or system-level tests.
Bio
Gerard Meszaros is an independent software development consultant and trainer with 30+ years experience in software and over a decade of experience in agile methods. He authored xUnit Test Patterns – Refactoring Test Code which won a Jolt Productivity Award. He is based near Calgary Canada and has coached teams and taught courses as far afield as China, India and Europe.
About the conference
CRAFT is about software craftsmanship, which tools, methods, practices should be part of the toolbox of a modern developer and company, and it is a compass on new technologies, trends.
Community comments
Excellent presentation
by Richard Langlois,
Literacy, clarity and domain language - Oh My!
by Bill Turner,
Excellent presentation
by Richard Langlois,
Your message is awaiting moderation. Thank you for participating in the discussion.
I completely agree with you Gerard, writing test using domain language is the way to go.
Richard Langlois
Principal Software Engineer, Microsoft, Burlington, MA.
Literacy, clarity and domain language - Oh My!
by Bill Turner,
Your message is awaiting moderation. Thank you for participating in the discussion.
No short presentation can be all things. This one explains well the ideas of the right abstraction level, ultimately arriving at tests that are literate, clear and concise, and use domain language. He argues that we should not think of what to put into a test, but rather what can we leave out. His demonstration doing so is good, though I may experiment a bit with builders that have an "irrelevant" object method, or otherwise try to improve upon that concept. I also liked his reasoning for embracing the given/when/then paradigm. It is something I came to awhile ago for the same reasons. It focuses one on the essence of the test. Finally, his use of method names closely mirrors what I feel should be done.
The presentation offers more. These are just the highlights I found worth sharing. Watch it.