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GoT

GoDoc

Pronounced like "goatee".

This package is all about making tests easier to write and by improving clarity through removing boilerplate and code not related to test assertions.

The Four-Phase Test paradigm heavily influences the decisions made for this library.

Load: test fixtures as files (aka: testdata)

One approach to writing tests, particularly when they have non-trivial setup, is to use file-based test fixtures.

Embedding in code is usually a suitable option for light-medium complexity code, but as things grow more sophisticated, particularly for integration testing and fuzz testing, embedding all of that state into code gets messy, especially as time passes.

While opening up files is not difficult on it's own, there can be more to it (eg: decoding as JSON). Beyond dealing with single files, consider reading directories (maybe even recursively). Each new line of boilerplate like this increases the noise-to-signal ratio for the test.

Working with text (string) and bytes ([]byte)

This package includes got.Load for loading files on disk into an annotated struct to eliminate this boilerplate from your own code.

package mypackage

import (
  "strings"
  "testing"

  "github.com/dominicbarnes/got/v2"
)

// testdata/input.txt
// hello world

// testdata/expected.txt
// HELLO WORLD

func TestUppercase(t *testing.T) {
  // define test cases
  type Test struct {
    Input    string `testdata:"input.txt"`
    Expected string `testdata:"expected.txt"`
  }

  // load test fixtures
  var test Test
  got.Load(t, "testdata", &test)

  // execute the code under test
  actual := Uppercase(test.Input)

  // perform test assertions
  if actual != test.Expected {
    t.Fatalf(`expected "%s", got "%s"`, test.Expected, actual)
  }
}

// code under test
func Uppercase(input string) string {
  return strings.ToUpper(input)
}

While contrived, this demonstates a clear separation between test phases, making it easier to identify what the test is intending to cover.

Here, simple string values are used, but []byte could be used and it would basically behave as you would expect. (raw file contents, no additional decode)

Decoding complex types (eg: struct, map, slice)

Taking this to the next logical step, it is also possible for got.Load to unmarshal test fixtures into more sophisticated types (such as a map). The file extension maps to a codec (eg: JSON, YAML) to perform the decode.

package mypackage

import (
  "reflect"
  "strings"
  "testing"

  "github.com/dominicbarnes/got/v2"
)

// testdata/input.json
// {
//     "a": "hello",
//     "b": "world"
// }

// testdata/expected.json
// {
//     "a": "HELLO",
//     "b": "WORLD"
// }

func TestUppercaseMap(t *testing.T) {
  // define test cases
  type Test struct {
    Input    map[string]string `testdata:"input.json"`
    Expected map[string]string `testdata:"expected.json"`
  }

  // load test fixtures
  var test Test
  got.LoadTestData(t, "testdata", &test)

  // execute the code under test
  actual := UppercaseMap(test.Input)

  // perform test assertions
  if !reflect.DeepEqual(actual, test.Expected) {
    t.Fatalf(`expected "%+v", got "%+v"`, test.Expected, actual)
  }
}

// code under test
func UppercaseMap(input map[string]string) map[string]string {
  output := make(map[string]string)
  for k, v := range input {
    output[k] = strings.ToUpper(v)
  }
  return output
}

Out of the box, this library supports decoding JSON (.json) and YAML (.yml, .yaml). You can define your own codecs or override the defaults using got/codec.Register.

Working with dynamic maps of files (explode)

When testing a component that can produce outputs dynamically, or even if just having a single file for the entire output is undesirable, a map type can be used with the explode struct tag option to map to multiple files with a glob.

package mypackage

import (
  "reflect"
  "strings"
  "testing"

  "github.com/dominicbarnes/got/v2"
)

// testdata/input.json
// {
//   "a": "hello",
//   "b": "world"
// }

// testdata/expected/a.txt
// HELLO

// testdata/expected/a.txt
// WORLD

func TestUppercaseMap(t *testing.T) {
  // define test cases
  type Test struct {
    Input    map[string]string `testdata:"input.json"`
    Expected map[string]string `testdata:"expected/*.txt,explode"`
  }

  // load test fixtures
  var test Test
  got.LoadTestData(t, "testdata", &test)

  // execute the code under test
  actual := UppercaseAsFiles(test.Input)

  // perform test assertions
  if !reflect.DeepEqual(actual, test.Expected) {
    t.Fatalf(`expected "%+v", got "%+v"`, test.Expected, actual)
  }
}

// code under test
func UppercaseAsFiles(input map[string]string) map[string]string {
  output := make(map[string]string)
  for k, v := range input {
    output[fmt.Sprintf("expected/%s.txt", k)] = strings.ToUpper(v)
  }
  return output
}

Notice that the testdata struct tag uses a glob pattern along with the explode option.

The Input map (not using explode) will look like:

map[string]string{
  "a": "hello",
  "b": "world",
}

The Expected map (using explode) will look like:

map[string]string{
  "expected/a.txt": "HELLO",
  "expected/b.txt": "WORLD",
}

Suite: Directory-driven test cases

Consider testing a component with medium-high complexity. Breaking out each case into manually-defined test functions is workable, but becomes repetitive if the test setup is always identical.

One approach would be to leverage table-driven tests to perform that identical setup within a loop. GoT provides another approach, which targets a directory and treats each sub-directory there as a separate test case.

package mypackage

import (
  "strings"
  "testing"

  "github.com/dominicbarnes/got/v2"
)

// testdata/hello-world/input.txt
// hello world

// testdata/hello-world/expected.txt
// HELLO WORLD


// testdata/foo-bar/input.txt
// foo bar

// testdata/foo-bar/expected.txt
// FOO BAR


func TestUppercaseSuite(t *testing.T) {
  // define test cases
  type Test struct {
    Input    string `testdata:"input.txt"`
    Expected string `testdata:"expected.txt"`
  }

  // define test suite
  suite := got.TestSuite{
    Dir: "testdata",
    TestFunc: func (t *testing.T, c got.TestCase) {
      // load test fixtures
      var test Test
      c.Load(t, &test)

      // execute the code under test
      actual := Uppercase(test.Input)

      // perform test assertions
      if actual != test.Expected {
        t.Fatalf(`expected "%s", got "%s"`, test.Expected, actual)
      }
    },
  }

  // run the test suite: "hello-world" and "foo-bar" each get a sub-test
  suite.Run(t)
}

// code under test
func Uppercase(input string) string {
  return strings.ToUpper(input)
}

Skipping test cases

Sometimes, a test case needs to be disabled temporarily, but deleting it altogether may not be desirable. To accomplish this, simply rename the directory to have a ".skip" suffix.

Alternatively, if skipping all but specific tests is desired, add a ".only" suffix to skip all other test cases.

Assert: using and updating golden files

In Golang, golden files are generated when your code is known to be working as intended, then saved and referenced later to ensure that outputs do not changed unexpectedly. This is very useful when outputs are difficult to defined by hand (eg: binary data) or are just large (eg: ETL testing).

got.Assert is the companion to got.Load in that it takes an annotated struct but is more focused on writing the data to disk rather than reading it, creating these "golden files". There are 2 modes of operation here, determined by the test.update-golden flag.

By default, got.Assert will compare the input to what already exists on disk, failing the test if they do not match. When go test -update-golden is used, the input will simply be written to disk, skipping the assertion altogether.

package mypackage

import (
  "strings"
  "testing"

  "github.com/dominicbarnes/got/v2"
)

// NOTE: no expected.txt files are defined

// testdata/hello-world/input.txt
// hello world

// testdata/foo-bar/input.txt
// foo bar

func TestUppercaseAssert(t *testing.T) {
  // define test inputs
  type Test struct {
    Input string `testdata:"input.txt"`
  }

  // define test expectations
  type Expected struct {
    Output string `testdata:"expected.txt"`
  }

  // define test suite
  suite := got.TestSuite{
    Dir: "testdata",
    TestFunc: func (t *testing.T, c got.TestCase) {
      // load test fixtures
      var test Test
      c.Load(t, &test)

      // execute the code under test
      actual := Uppercase(test.Input)

      // perform test assertions
      // 1. tests will fail as expected.txt files are missing (FAIL)
      // 2. add -update-golden and expected.txt files will be written (PASS)
      // 3. tests will pass as long as outputs don't change (PASS)
      got.Assert(&Expected{Output: actual})
    },
  }

  // run the test suite
  suite.Run(t)
}

// code under test
func Uppercase(input string) string {
  return strings.ToUpper(input)
}

RunTestSuite: putting it all together

Using the RunTestSuite helper function combines basically every feature above into an easy-to-grok function call for straightforward test suites.

It uses type parameters (aka: generics) to accept a function with 2 parameters: *testing.T and a test configuration struct (conventionally named Test) and then returning a test assertions struct (conventionally named Expected).

The Test struct is passed to Load automatically and the returned Expected is passed to Assert automatically.

package mypackage

import (
  "strings"
  "testing"

  "github.com/dominicbarnes/got/v2"
)

// testdata/hello-world/input.txt
// hello world

// testdata/hello-world/expected.txt
// HELLO WORLD

// testdata/foo-bar/input.txt
// foo bar

// testdata/foo-bar/expected.txt
// FOO BAR

func TestUppercase(t *testing.T) {
  // define test inputs
  type Test struct {
    Input string `testdata:"input.txt"`
  }

  // define test expectations
  type Expected struct {
    Output string `testdata:"expected.txt"`
  }

  got.RunTestSuite(t, "testdata", func (t *testing.T, tc got.TestCase, test Test) Expected {
    // execute the code under test
    actual := Uppercase(test.Input)

    // return the actual output for assertions 
    return Expected{Output: actual}
  })
}

// code under test
func Uppercase(input string) string {
  return strings.ToUpper(input)
}

While contrived, the boilerplate for things like Load and Assert being removed really puts the focus on the test itself as much as possible, which is even more obvious for more sophisticated tests.

Check out godoc for more information about the API.

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A package with helpers for reducing boilerplate in tests.

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