Ben Finney wrote:
> Jean-Paul Calderone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
>> 1) Write unit tests for your code. Keep writing unit tests until
>> you have some that _don't pass_. Then fix your code so that they
>> do. When you do further development, write the tests first, then
>> implement the code that makes them pass.
>
> Hear hear.
>
> Be advised, though, that attempting to apply unit tests to code that
> wasn't designed with testing in mind may very quickly reveal a poor
> design. [0] If you can't easily test pieces of the code independently,
> you probably haven't written those pieces to be loosely coupled and
> well-defined.
>
I will whole-heartedly admit that my code is probably poorly designed.
*shrug* Though, I *do* try to write everything in such a way as to be
able to easily re-use it later. When I wrote little things just to help
me sysadmin, I learned that was really key to making my life easier.
Besides, I am lazy... reuse certainly serves my needs there! :-)
>
> The moral? Writing unit tests *along with* the functional code will
> result in a design that is loosely coupled, and probably
> better-defined. Also, hopefully, easy to test :-)
>
I think I have more to learn on the concept of unit-testing. I have
never seen a group push the idea so hard. I have read about unit
testing before, and even written tests (in other languages) to test
modules of library code that I put together once, but that was about it.
I need to, I think, get more "into" the concept, though. It isn't
something that I am able to just whip out and go "Hey, a widget unit
test! And it works!" probably because of my own lack of practice.
>
> [0] I have no idea whether this is the case for the OP. It's a very
> common symptom that arises from people who are first advised to
> introduce tests to their code, though.
>
It is very likely that it is the case. I am, by all means, what I could
consider to be a novice programmer when it comes to anything outside of
my little world of PHP. I can write web applications in PHP until the
cows come home with little to no problem, and I can play with SQL the
same way. But, I seem to have problems when I step out of that little
box, and so, that tells me that I need to work harder at it. :-)
-- Mike
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