Re: Looking for an intelligent tool to generate junit tests
Ajay wrote:
On Jun 11, 6:00 pm, Mark Space <marksp...@sbc.global.net> wrote:
Ajay wrote:
What I would like the tool to do is to generate some form of automated
test for getters, setters, hashcode and equals.
Have you tried NetBeans? That will generate JUnit tests automatically
for you.
Ok... so I installed netbeans to try this out. I wrote a quick class,
and generated a test.
<rant>
Mark: WTF? Any tool / ide can generate an empty shell - eclipse
generates a dumb junit shell too. This is almost as bad as writing the
whole test yourself! I think I made it clear that I need an active
working test, not a shell that has 'fail("The test case is a
prototype.")' at the end of every test.
Damn, I wasted all this time. And even more time bitching about
netbeans.
</rant>
Am I missing something? Perhaps a netbeans plugin or a setting or
something else? Come on... spill the beans on this one...
You may be asking for too much. As a sort of thought
experiment, consider this simple class:
public class Curtain {
private Fringe fringe;
public void setFringe(Fringe fringe) {
this.fringe = fringe;
}
public Fringe getFringe() {
return fringe;
}
}
Here's the experiment: Write a unit test to determine whether
this class is correctly implemented.
See the problem? You don't have enough information to know
what "correct" is! Was setFringe supposed to accept a null
argument, or throw an exception, or automagically substitute
Fringe.NO_FRINGE? Were setFringe and getFringe supposed to
make defensive copies? Was setFringe supposed to send a
ChangeEvent to the Curtain's listeners? And so on, and so
on: The best you can do by examining the source is to deduce
what the class actually does, and that's not what you need
when designing tests of what it *should* be doing.
If you, with all the advantages of intellect and experience,
are unable to construct a suitable unit test just by looking at
the code, how can you expect a stupid computer to do so?
--
Eric.Sosman@sun.com