Avoid Over-Specifying Tests
The number one problem that I see developers have when practicing test-first development that impedes them from refactoring their code is that they over-specify behavior in their tests. This leads developers to write more tests than are needed, which can become a burden when refactoring code. I am a big advocate of having a complete …
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Read MoreUse Mocks to Test Workflows
Unit testing frameworks are simple but I find them highly valuable. They contain a collection of assertions that I can use to validate a range of values and behaviors in the code that I’m building. I use assertions to verify that values are within bounds, exceptions are called when expected and not called when unexpected, …
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Read MoreTest Behaviors, Not Implementations
One of the keys to doing test-first development successfully and having the tests that you create to support you in refactoring code rather than breaking when you refactor code, is to write tests against the behaviors you want to create rather than how you implement those behaviors. This is an important insight but not always …
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Read MoreShow What’s Important
Another aspect of using unit tests as specifications is to clearly show what’s important in each test. We do this primarily by naming things well and calling out generalizations and key concepts in the names of the symbols that we use. Every test has a name but you never call it, the system calls it …
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