Göktuğ Kayaalp <s...@gkayaalp.com> writes: > On Fri, Nov 01, 2013 at 10:42:23AM +1100, Ben Finney wrote: > > Keep the body of “if __name__ == '__main__':” to an absolute > > minimum. Put all of the set-up and process-end functionality into > > discrete functions with discrete purposes, clear return values, and > > explicit parameters. > > This is usually the way I write my modules, and I do test my command > line interfaces in a manner similar to your example. But what I was > asking is how to actually run these programs within a command shell > session and test them in a more *tangible* fashion:
I think by “more tangible fashion” you're asking not about unit testing, but about full-system testing. This is called by several names – behaviour testing, integration testing, acceptance testing – each having different connotations. Testing at levels of abstraction above the unit is important, but Python's ‘unittest’ is not a good fit. You'll need a different tool. For behaviour testing, I recommend Behave, which lets you describe assertions in English and have them automatically tested <URL:https://pypi.python.org/pypi/behave/>. For integration testing, I recommend an automated build system like Jenkins <URL:http://jenkins-ci.org/> which can get your full source tree, build it using your build system, and run all your arbitrary test commands. For running arbitrary commands as tests, you might be interested in Atheist <URL:http://arco.esi.uclm.es/~david.villa/atheist/html/>. I haven't tried it. > I write a secondary script, 'app_tester', which is similar to 'app', > but before running app.main.main, it inserts ~/app to the front of > sys.path. I think that's a poor solution. It's the worst of both worlds: you have a special-case tool, but one that doesn't actually test the application properly since it's not a very accurate representation of how the application will actually be installed. Better is simply using the build system to do a real, temporary install, and running the tests in there. -- \ “Odious ideas are not entitled to hide from criticism behind | `\ the human shield of their believers' feelings.” —Richard | _o__) Stallman | Ben Finney -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
