On 9 Dec 2008, at 19:06, James Byrne wrote:
I have decided that for now I am going to use the authlogic gem to
provide authentication for the project I am creating. The question
arises, since authentication is a user feature request and since it is
to be satisfied through the use of a gem (not a plugin) then should
one
test for the availability of the gem or not?
Secondly, given that a gem is providing the authentication logic
(and is
not my code which therefore should not be tested by me) then what
should
one test for with respect to the specific implementation? The
existence
of particular attributes? The existence of a users model?
Does one write step definitions (assuming rspec) like:
When /users are authenticated/ do
#TODO: This does not work even when the model class exists.
User.should exist
end
When /authentication by authlogic/ do
#TODO: Find out how to test for a loaded gem within an application
end
If you're working at the level of Cucumber features, I would stay well
away from implementation details like the particular technology you're
using for authentication.
Remember this is called Behaviour Driven Development[1] for a reason.
You're focussing on specifying the desired *behaviour* of the system.
How you chose to satisfy the user's need for that behaviour is an
entirely separate matter.
A large benefit of having Acceptance Tests, IMO, is that you could
radically change your implementation under the hood, such as switching
to a different authentication mechanism, and the features would still
be valid. You might have to code up some of your steps a little
differently, but as long as the users want the same thing from the
system, the features should not have to change in the slightest.
[1]http://dannorth.net/introducing-bdd
Matt Wynne
http://blog.mattwynne.net
http://www.songkick.com
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