Re: Unit testing revisited

[Geir Magnusson Jr]

Richard Liang wrote:
Geir Magnusson Jr wrote:


George Harley wrote:


I don't want an argument any more than the next person but ... I 
completely agree with the above statement. If you can't test code by 
going through the public API then how will the users ever get to 
exercise it in the "real world" ?


The key is that we aren't suggesting we don't test code by the public 
API - we have to do that.  But rather, we need to ALSO test the 
internals w/o going through the public API....

Hello Geir,

But rather, we need to ALSO test the internals w/o going through the 
public API....

Why? IMHO, it's easier to write test cases through public API. And the 
internals may possibly change, so if we write test cases directly for 
the internals, our test cases will not be stable.

I don't think it's easier to write test cases for internals though a 
public API, because you can call the internal methods directly to see if 
they do as they promise, where it's not so easy to always have the same 
thing happen through an indirect public API.

Also, wrt things breaking..... yes, tests that ensure that something 
works as expected will need to change if the expectation changes.

That also is exactly what you want, right?  To know if you broke a 
'internal contract' in a class?

geir