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Overview and feature list for the SimpleTest PHP unit tester and web tester
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<a href="index.html">SimpleTest</a>
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<span class="chosen">Overview</span>
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<a href="unit_test_documentation.html">Unit tester</a>
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<a href="group_test_documentation.html">Group tests</a>
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<a href="mock_objects_documentation.html">Mock objects</a>
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<a href="partial_mocks_documentation.html">Partial mocks</a>
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<a href="reporter_documentation.html">Reporting</a>
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<a href="expectation_documentation.html">Expectations</a>
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<a href="web_tester_documentation.html">Web tester</a>
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<a href="form_testing_documentation.html">Testing forms</a>
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<a href="authentication_documentation.html">Authentication</a>
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<a href="browser_documentation.html">Scriptable browser</a>
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<h1>Overview of SimpleTest</h1>
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<a href="#summary">Quick summary</a>
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of the SimpleTest tool for PHP.
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<a href="#features">List of features</a>,
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both current ones and those planned.
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There are plenty of <a href="#resources">unit testing resources</a>
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<p><a class="target" name="summary"><h2>What is SimpleTest?</h2></a></p>
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The heart of SimpleTest is a testing framework built around
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These are written as extensions of base test case classes,
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each extended with methods that actually contain test code.
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Top level test scripts then invoke the <span class="new_code">run()</span>
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methods on every one of these test cases in order.
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Each test method is written to invoke various assertions that
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the developer expects to be true such as
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<span class="new_code">assertEqual()</span>.
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If the expectation is correct, then a successful result is dispatched to the
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observing test reporter, but any failure triggers an alert
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and a description of the mismatch.
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A <a href="unit_test_documentation.html">test case</a> looks like this...
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require_once('simpletest/autorun.php');
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class <strong>MyTestCase</strong> extends UnitTestCase {
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function testCreatedLogFile() {
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$log = &new Log('my.log');
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$log->message('Hello');
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$this->assertTrue(file_exists('my.log'));
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These tools are designed for the developer.
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Tests are written in the PHP language itself more or less
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as the application itself is built.
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The advantage of using PHP itself as the testing language is that
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there are no new languages to learn, testing can start straight away,
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and the developer can test any part of the code.
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Basically, all parts that can be accessed by the application code can also be
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accessed by the test code, if they are in the same programming language.
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The simplest type of test case is the
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<a href="unit_tester_documentation.html">UnitTestCase</a>.
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This class of test case includes standard tests for equality,
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references and pattern matching.
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All these test the typical expectations of what you would
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expect the result of a function or method to be.
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This is by far the most common type of test in the daily
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routine of development, making up about 95% of test cases.
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The top level task of a web application though is not to
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produce correct output from its methods and objects, but
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to generate web pages.
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The <a href="web_tester_documentation.html">WebTestCase</a> class tests web
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It simulates a web browser requesting a page, complete with
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cookies, proxies, secure connections, authentication, forms, frames and most
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With this type of test case, the developer can assert that
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information is present in the page and that forms and
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sessions are handled correctly.
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A <a href="web_tester_documentation.html">WebTestCase</a> looks like this...
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require_once('simpletest/autorun.php');
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require_once('simpletest/web_tester.php');
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class <strong>MySiteTest</strong> extends WebTestCase {
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function testHomePage() {
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$this->get('http://www.my-site.com/index.php');
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$this->assertTitle('My Home Page');
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$this->clickLink('Contact');
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$this->assertTitle('Contact me');
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$this->assertPattern('/Email me at/');
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<p><a class="target" name="features"><h2>Feature list</h2></a></p>
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The following is a very rough outline of past and future features
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and their expected point of release.
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I am afraid it is liable to change without warning, as meeting the
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milestones rather depends on time available.
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Green stuff has been coded, but not necessarily released yet.
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If you have a pressing need for a green but unreleased feature
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then you should check-out the code from Sourceforge SVN directly.
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<td>Unit test case</td>
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<td>Core test case class and assertions</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Html display</td>
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<td>Simplest possible display</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Autoloading of test cases</td>
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Reading a file with test cases and loading them into a
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group test automatically
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Mock objects</td>
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Objects capable of simulating other objects removing
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Web test case</td>
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<td>Allows link following and title tag matching</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Partial mocks</td>
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Mocking parts of a class for testing less than a class
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or for complex simulations
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Web cookie handling</td>
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<td>Correct handling of cookies when fetching pages</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Following redirects</td>
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<td>Page fetching automatically follows 300 redirects</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Form parsing</td>
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<td>Ability to submit simple forms and read default form values</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Command line interface</td>
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<td>Test display without the need of a web browser</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Exposure of expectation classes</td>
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<td>Can create precise tests with mocks as well as test cases</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>XML output and parsing</td>
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Allows multi host testing and the integration of acceptance
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Browser component</td>
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Exposure of lower level web browser interface for more
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>HTTP authentication</td>
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Fetching protected web pages with basic authentication
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Can connect to https: pages</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Proxy support</td>
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<td>Can connect via. common proxies</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>Frames support</td>
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<td>Handling of frames in web test cases</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0</td>
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<td>File upload testing</td>
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<td>Can simulate the input type file tag</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0.1</td>
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<td>Mocking interfaces</td>
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Can generate mock objects to interfaces as well as classes
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and class interfaces are carried for type hints
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<td style="color: green;">1.0.1</td>
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<td>Testing exceptions</td>
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<td>Similar to testing PHP errors</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0.1</td>
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<td>HTML label support</td>
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<td>Can access all controls using the visual label</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0.1</td>
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<td>Base tag support</td>
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<td>Respects page base tag when clicking</td>
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<td style="color: green;">1.0.1</td>
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<td>PHP 5 E_STRICT compliant</td>
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<td>PHP 5 only version that works with the E_STRICT error level</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.1</td>
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<td>BDD style fixtures</td>
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<td>Can import fixtures using a mixin like given() method</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.5</td>
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<td>Reporting machinery enhancements</td>
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<td>Improved message passing for better cooperation with IDEs</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.5</td>
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<td>Fluent mock interface</td>
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<td>More flexible and concise mock objects</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.6</td>
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<td>Localisation</td>
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<td>Messages abstracted and code generated</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.6</td>
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<td>CSS selectors</td>
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<td>HTML content can be examined using CSS selectors</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.7</td>
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<td>HTML table assertions</td>
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<td>Can match HTML or table elements to expectations</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.7</td>
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<td>Unified acceptance testing model</td>
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<td>Content searchable through selectors combined with expectations</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.7</td>
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<td>DatabaseTestCase</td>
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<td>SQL selectors and DB drivers</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.7</td>
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<td>IFrame support</td>
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<td>Reads IFrame content that can be refreshed</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.8</td>
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<td>Alternate HTML parsers</td>
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<td>Can detect compiled parsers for performance improvements</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.8</td>
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<td>Integrated Selenium support</td>
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<td>Easy to use built in Selenium driver and tutorial</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.9</td>
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<td>Code coverage</td>
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<td>Reports using the bundled tool when using XDebug</td>
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<td style="color: red;">1.9</td>
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<td>Deprecation of old methods</td>
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<td>Simpler interface for SimpleTest2</td>
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<td style="color: red;">2.0</td>
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<td>Javascript suport</td>
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<td>Use of PECL module to add Javascript to the native browser</td>
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<td style="color: red;">3.0</td>
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PHP5 migraton will start straight after the version 1.0.1 series,
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whereupon only PHP 5.1+ will be supported.
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SimpleTest is currently compatible with PHP 5, but will not
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make use of all of the new features until version 1.1.
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<p><a class="target" name="resources"><h2>Web resources for testing</h2></a></p>
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Process is at least as important as tools.
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The type of process that makes the heaviest use of a developer's
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testing tool is of course
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<a href="http://www.extremeprogramming.org/">Extreme Programming</a>.
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<a href="http://www.agilealliance.com/articles/index">Agile Methodologies</a>
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which combine various practices to "flatten the cost curve" of software development.
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More extreme still is <a href="http://www.testdriven.com/modules/news/">Test Driven Development</a>,
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where you very strictly adhere to the rule of no coding until you have a test.
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If you're more of a planner, or believe that experience trumps evolution,
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<a href="http://www.therationaledge.com/content/dec_01/f_spiritOfTheRUP_pk.html">RUP</a> approach.
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I haven't tried it, but even I can see that you will need test tools (see figure 9).
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Most unit testers clone <a href="http://www.junit.org/">JUnit</a> to some degree,
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as far as the interface at least. There is a wealth of information on the
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JUnit site including the
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<a href="http://junit.sourceforge.net/doc/faq/faq.htm">FAQ</a>
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which contains plenty of general advice on testing.
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Once you get bitten by the bug you will certainly appreciate the phrase
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<a href="http://junit.sourceforge.net/doc/testinfected/testing.htm">test infected</a>
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coined by Eric Gamma.
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If you are still reviewing which unit tester to use you can find pretty complete
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<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unit_testing_frameworks">Wikipedia</a>,
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<a href="http://www.testingfaqs.org/t-unit.html">Software testing FAQ</a>,
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and <a href="http://www.opensourcetesting.org/functional.php">Open source testing</a>.
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There is still very little material on using mock objects, which is a shame
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as unit testing without them is a lot more work.
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The <a href="http://www.sidewize.com/company/mockobjects.pdf">original mock objects paper</a>
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is very Java focused, but still worth a read.
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The most authoritive sources are probably
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<a href="http://mockobjects.com">the original mock objects site</a> and
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<a href="http://jmock.org/">JMock</a>.
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Java centric, but tucked away in PDFs they contain some deep knowledge on using mocks from the
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extended experience of the concept inventors.
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As a new technology there are plenty of discussions and debate on how to use mocks,
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often on Wikis such as
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<a href="http://xpdeveloper.com/cgi-bin/oldwiki.cgi?MockObjects">Extreme Tuesday</a>
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or <a href="http://www.mockobjects.com/MocksObjectsPaper.html">www.mockobjects.com</a>
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or <a href="http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?MockObject">the original C2 Wiki</a>.
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Injecting mocks into a class is the main area of debate for which this
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<a href="http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/java/library/j-mocktest.html">paper on IBM</a>
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makes a good starting point.
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There are plenty of web testing tools, but the scriptable ones
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are mostly are written in Java and
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tutorials and advice are rather thin on the ground.
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The only hope is to look at the documentation for
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<a href="http://httpunit.sourceforge.net/">HTTPUnit</a>,
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<a href="http://htmlunit.sourceforge.net/">HTMLUnit</a>
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or <a href="http://jwebunit.sourceforge.net/">JWebUnit</a> and hope for clues.
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There are some XML driven test frameworks, but again most
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Most significant is a new generation of tools that run directly in the web browser
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<a href="http://www.openqa.org/selenium/">Selenium</a> and
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<a href="http://wtr.rubyforge.org/">Watir</a>.
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They are non-trivial to set up and slow to run, but can essentially test anything.
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As SimpleTest does not support JavaScript you would probably
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have to look at these tools anyway if you have highly dynamic
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References and related information...
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<a href="unit_test_documentation.html">Documentation for SimpleTest</a>.
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<a href="http://www.lastcraft.com/first_test_tutorial.php">How to write PHP test cases</a>
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is a fairly advanced tutorial.
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<a href="http://simpletest.org/api/">SimpleTest API</a> from phpdoc.
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<a href="index.html">SimpleTest</a>
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<span class="chosen">Overview</span>
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<a href="unit_test_documentation.html">Unit tester</a>
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<a href="group_test_documentation.html">Group tests</a>
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<a href="mock_objects_documentation.html">Mock objects</a>
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<a href="partial_mocks_documentation.html">Partial mocks</a>
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<a href="reporter_documentation.html">Reporting</a>
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<a href="expectation_documentation.html">Expectations</a>
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<a href="web_tester_documentation.html">Web tester</a>
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<a href="form_testing_documentation.html">Testing forms</a>
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<a href="authentication_documentation.html">Authentication</a>
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<div class="copyright">
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Copyright<br>Marcus Baker 2006
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