Category Archives: CS@Worcester

Stubs vs. Mocks

This week in class, we learned about test doubles. Test doubles are make-believe objects in code that take the place of actual objects for testing purposes. Test doubles are a great resource if you are working on a team project and your collaborator’s code is incomplete or not there at all. The test doubles we went over in class are dummies, fakes, stubs, and mocks. And being honest, I didn’t have the best understanding of it at first. But creating stubs in Activity 12 gave me a greater comprehension, as well as interest in it. Upon doing a little more research on stubs, I found a blog all the way from 2007 called Unit Testing with Stubs and Mocks. The blog compared stubs and mocks to each other, as well as which test double is more useful.

Stubs

Stubs are used by implementing part of your peer’s code as a concrete class. How much of the collaborator code needed depends on the minimum code needed to properly test something in the class. A stub’s job is to do nothing more than return the expected value needed for the test to pass. Stubs can also be implemented inside the test class. This saves the tester a lot of time because the stub class now becomes a separate, anonymous declaration. As a result, the same stub does not have to be reused across multiple unit tests. And since the stub becomes a separate declaration, the number of stubs used in a project becomes significantly lower.

A drawback from this however, is that the separately declared stub does not account for any changes that your peer might make to the code. This can mean a lot of work for the tester because new methods and variables may need to be declared. As a solution to this case, it is recommended that a base class is created in the test directory of your project. This way, if a collaborator makes an update to the code, you limit the amount of work you do by only updating the base class.

Mocks

Mock objects are used to obtain a high level of control over testing the given implementation. Mock object generators such as EasyMock and JMock are great tools that create mock objects based on the class being tested. If a test fails in EasyMock, it will create an obvious message. When testing with stubs, it is uncertain whether the test will fail or not. This however leads to constant changes made to the test cases. But through constant updating, the unit tester gains a greater knowledge of the implementation.

When to Use

In the case of which is better between stubs and mocks, there is no wrong answer. There are scenarios where using stubs will fit the test better, but there will also be scenarios where the usage of mocks is the better option. For example, if you need to nest a method call on the collaborator, then stub objects are the way to go. Mocks are more robust than stubs, but stubs are easier to read and maintain. However, mock users say that it is worth it to use mocks over stubs in the long term.

Reference

https://spring.io/blog/2007/01/15/unit-testing-with-stubs-and-mocks

From the blog CS@Worcester – Blog del William by William Cordor and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Static vs Dynamic Testing

Source:
https://www.browserstack.com/guide/static-testing-vs-dynamic-testing#:~:text=Static%20testing%20focuses%20on%20reviewing,to%20find%20bugs%20during%20runtime.&text=It%20is%20performed%20at%20the%20later%20stage%20of%20the%20software%20development.

This article is titled “Static vs Dynamic Testing” and explains the differences between them and how they allow for the development of quality software. Static testing is testing where the application isn’t being actively used. Code is manually read through to search for errors. As a result, a computer is not necessarily required for this form of testing as design documents containing the code can be reviewed. This kind of testing is done before the code is executed and early in the development process. The benefits to static testing are that defects are able to be found earlier in the process, it’s usually more cost-effective than other testing techniques, leads to more maintainable code, and encourages collaboration between team members. However some disadvantages of static testing are that not all of the issues could be found until the program/application actually runs, it depends on the experience of the reviewers for it to be effective, and it usually has to be done alongside dynamic testing to uncover other potential issues.

Dynamic testing involves giving an application input and analyzing the output. Code is being compiled in a run-time environment. This form of testing also relies on the expertise of the reviewers as deep knowledge of the system is required to understand how and why a system reacts based on the input. The advantages of dynamic testing are that runtime errors, memory leaks, and other issues that only come to fruition during code execution are revealed, helps verify that the software is working as intended by the developers, and ensures that all parts of the system work together appropriately. However some disadvantages of dynamic testing are that it can be time-consuming, may not cover all possible scenarios, and may be difficult to test uncommon instances in the program. 

Overall it is important to realize that static and dynamic testing are both important in their own ways and emphasize the importance of performing various kinds of testing methods to ensure an application works as intended. I chose this article because we discussed these topics in class and figured learning more about them would be beneficial. 

From the blog CS@Worcester – Shawn In Tech by Shawn Budzinski and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Testing and Testing (One of them is a Fake).

 Hello!

This week in class we’ve been discussing testing using fakes, more specifically with Stubs. Our first assignment this week told us about the different kinds of fakes used in testing, which I found a little confusing at first, since I would have liked to have seen a more literal example of all the different variants. That is why, for the sake of improving my knowledge on the subject going forward, since this is something we’ll be talking about, I decided to do some reading on stubs and mocks, from a blog post written by Raphael F. on Medium. 

The article spoke at length about the differences between mocks and stubs, and gave some meaningful examples of both. I appreciated the use of diagrams in the article, as it shows what each of them interacts with and how (i.e. A stub doesn’t interact with a database, and is instead a hard-coded value to be grabbed for testing). That wasn’t something that was immediately obvious to me in the assignments, and during our assignment on Stubs specifically it began to make more sense, but I appreciate the way the article laid out the concept in plain text, and made it easier to understand. I also liked that the blog post went over real world applications for each of the fake types, such a using stubs for read/write actions to keep the code and files separate, or using mocks for API testing. Admittedly I am still a little hazy on mocks, but I think by the time we go over it in class, it will all make sense.

 In closing, I really do value stubs as valuable pieces of testing equipment, since they allow me to test code without having to have every intricate detail finished. It makes sense for confirming methods got used, and that a specific path through the program is being followed. Stubs can’t do everything, you can’t really test complex operations on a piece of code that doesn’t work, but for basic probing and testing, I could see myself using stubs a lot more often. It feels like one of those things that I could have used before without thinking about it, which makes sense, as I am the kind of programmer who likes taking things one step at a time, and making sure one piece works before moving on to the next. But now that I have a name connected to the action, I really appreciate it as a tool that will play a big role in my programming career going forward.

 

 Link to the blog post in question: https://medium.com/@fideraphael/a-comprehensive-guide-to-stub-and-mock-testing-unveiling-the-essence-of-effective-software-testing-7f7817e3eab4

 

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Testing and Testing (One of them is a Fake).

 Hello!

This week in class we’ve been discussing testing using fakes, more specifically with Stubs. Our first assignment this week told us about the different kinds of fakes used in testing, which I found a little confusing at first, since I would have liked to have seen a more literal example of all the different variants. That is why, for the sake of improving my knowledge on the subject going forward, since this is something we’ll be talking about, I decided to do some reading on stubs and mocks, from a blog post written by Raphael F. on Medium. 

The article spoke at length about the differences between mocks and stubs, and gave some meaningful examples of both. I appreciated the use of diagrams in the article, as it shows what each of them interacts with and how (i.e. A stub doesn’t interact with a database, and is instead a hard-coded value to be grabbed for testing). That wasn’t something that was immediately obvious to me in the assignments, and during our assignment on Stubs specifically it began to make more sense, but I appreciate the way the article laid out the concept in plain text, and made it easier to understand. I also liked that the blog post went over real world applications for each of the fake types, such a using stubs for read/write actions to keep the code and files separate, or using mocks for API testing. Admittedly I am still a little hazy on mocks, but I think by the time we go over it in class, it will all make sense.

 In closing, I really do value stubs as valuable pieces of testing equipment, since they allow me to test code without having to have every intricate detail finished. It makes sense for confirming methods got used, and that a specific path through the program is being followed. Stubs can’t do everything, you can’t really test complex operations on a piece of code that doesn’t work, but for basic probing and testing, I could see myself using stubs a lot more often. It feels like one of those things that I could have used before without thinking about it, which makes sense, as I am the kind of programmer who likes taking things one step at a time, and making sure one piece works before moving on to the next. But now that I have a name connected to the action, I really appreciate it as a tool that will play a big role in my programming career going forward.

 

 Link to the blog post in question: https://medium.com/@fideraphael/a-comprehensive-guide-to-stub-and-mock-testing-unveiling-the-essence-of-effective-software-testing-7f7817e3eab4

 

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Testing and Testing (One of them is a Fake).

 Hello!

This week in class we’ve been discussing testing using fakes, more specifically with Stubs. Our first assignment this week told us about the different kinds of fakes used in testing, which I found a little confusing at first, since I would have liked to have seen a more literal example of all the different variants. That is why, for the sake of improving my knowledge on the subject going forward, since this is something we’ll be talking about, I decided to do some reading on stubs and mocks, from a blog post written by Raphael F. on Medium. 

The article spoke at length about the differences between mocks and stubs, and gave some meaningful examples of both. I appreciated the use of diagrams in the article, as it shows what each of them interacts with and how (i.e. A stub doesn’t interact with a database, and is instead a hard-coded value to be grabbed for testing). That wasn’t something that was immediately obvious to me in the assignments, and during our assignment on Stubs specifically it began to make more sense, but I appreciate the way the article laid out the concept in plain text, and made it easier to understand. I also liked that the blog post went over real world applications for each of the fake types, such a using stubs for read/write actions to keep the code and files separate, or using mocks for API testing. Admittedly I am still a little hazy on mocks, but I think by the time we go over it in class, it will all make sense.

 In closing, I really do value stubs as valuable pieces of testing equipment, since they allow me to test code without having to have every intricate detail finished. It makes sense for confirming methods got used, and that a specific path through the program is being followed. Stubs can’t do everything, you can’t really test complex operations on a piece of code that doesn’t work, but for basic probing and testing, I could see myself using stubs a lot more often. It feels like one of those things that I could have used before without thinking about it, which makes sense, as I am the kind of programmer who likes taking things one step at a time, and making sure one piece works before moving on to the next. But now that I have a name connected to the action, I really appreciate it as a tool that will play a big role in my programming career going forward.

 

 Link to the blog post in question: https://medium.com/@fideraphael/a-comprehensive-guide-to-stub-and-mock-testing-unveiling-the-essence-of-effective-software-testing-7f7817e3eab4

 

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Testing and Testing (One of them is a Fake).

 Hello!

This week in class we’ve been discussing testing using fakes, more specifically with Stubs. Our first assignment this week told us about the different kinds of fakes used in testing, which I found a little confusing at first, since I would have liked to have seen a more literal example of all the different variants. That is why, for the sake of improving my knowledge on the subject going forward, since this is something we’ll be talking about, I decided to do some reading on stubs and mocks, from a blog post written by Raphael F. on Medium. 

The article spoke at length about the differences between mocks and stubs, and gave some meaningful examples of both. I appreciated the use of diagrams in the article, as it shows what each of them interacts with and how (i.e. A stub doesn’t interact with a database, and is instead a hard-coded value to be grabbed for testing). That wasn’t something that was immediately obvious to me in the assignments, and during our assignment on Stubs specifically it began to make more sense, but I appreciate the way the article laid out the concept in plain text, and made it easier to understand. I also liked that the blog post went over real world applications for each of the fake types, such a using stubs for read/write actions to keep the code and files separate, or using mocks for API testing. Admittedly I am still a little hazy on mocks, but I think by the time we go over it in class, it will all make sense.

 In closing, I really do value stubs as valuable pieces of testing equipment, since they allow me to test code without having to have every intricate detail finished. It makes sense for confirming methods got used, and that a specific path through the program is being followed. Stubs can’t do everything, you can’t really test complex operations on a piece of code that doesn’t work, but for basic probing and testing, I could see myself using stubs a lot more often. It feels like one of those things that I could have used before without thinking about it, which makes sense, as I am the kind of programmer who likes taking things one step at a time, and making sure one piece works before moving on to the next. But now that I have a name connected to the action, I really appreciate it as a tool that will play a big role in my programming career going forward.

 

 Link to the blog post in question: https://medium.com/@fideraphael/a-comprehensive-guide-to-stub-and-mock-testing-unveiling-the-essence-of-effective-software-testing-7f7817e3eab4

 

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Testing and Testing (One of them is a Fake).

 Hello!

This week in class we’ve been discussing testing using fakes, more specifically with Stubs. Our first assignment this week told us about the different kinds of fakes used in testing, which I found a little confusing at first, since I would have liked to have seen a more literal example of all the different variants. That is why, for the sake of improving my knowledge on the subject going forward, since this is something we’ll be talking about, I decided to do some reading on stubs and mocks, from a blog post written by Raphael F. on Medium. 

The article spoke at length about the differences between mocks and stubs, and gave some meaningful examples of both. I appreciated the use of diagrams in the article, as it shows what each of them interacts with and how (i.e. A stub doesn’t interact with a database, and is instead a hard-coded value to be grabbed for testing). That wasn’t something that was immediately obvious to me in the assignments, and during our assignment on Stubs specifically it began to make more sense, but I appreciate the way the article laid out the concept in plain text, and made it easier to understand. I also liked that the blog post went over real world applications for each of the fake types, such a using stubs for read/write actions to keep the code and files separate, or using mocks for API testing. Admittedly I am still a little hazy on mocks, but I think by the time we go over it in class, it will all make sense.

 In closing, I really do value stubs as valuable pieces of testing equipment, since they allow me to test code without having to have every intricate detail finished. It makes sense for confirming methods got used, and that a specific path through the program is being followed. Stubs can’t do everything, you can’t really test complex operations on a piece of code that doesn’t work, but for basic probing and testing, I could see myself using stubs a lot more often. It feels like one of those things that I could have used before without thinking about it, which makes sense, as I am the kind of programmer who likes taking things one step at a time, and making sure one piece works before moving on to the next. But now that I have a name connected to the action, I really appreciate it as a tool that will play a big role in my programming career going forward.

 

 Link to the blog post in question: https://medium.com/@fideraphael/a-comprehensive-guide-to-stub-and-mock-testing-unveiling-the-essence-of-effective-software-testing-7f7817e3eab4

 

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Testing and Testing (One of them is a Fake).

 Hello!

This week in class we’ve been discussing testing using fakes, more specifically with Stubs. Our first assignment this week told us about the different kinds of fakes used in testing, which I found a little confusing at first, since I would have liked to have seen a more literal example of all the different variants. That is why, for the sake of improving my knowledge on the subject going forward, since this is something we’ll be talking about, I decided to do some reading on stubs and mocks, from a blog post written by Raphael F. on Medium. 

The article spoke at length about the differences between mocks and stubs, and gave some meaningful examples of both. I appreciated the use of diagrams in the article, as it shows what each of them interacts with and how (i.e. A stub doesn’t interact with a database, and is instead a hard-coded value to be grabbed for testing). That wasn’t something that was immediately obvious to me in the assignments, and during our assignment on Stubs specifically it began to make more sense, but I appreciate the way the article laid out the concept in plain text, and made it easier to understand. I also liked that the blog post went over real world applications for each of the fake types, such a using stubs for read/write actions to keep the code and files separate, or using mocks for API testing. Admittedly I am still a little hazy on mocks, but I think by the time we go over it in class, it will all make sense.

 In closing, I really do value stubs as valuable pieces of testing equipment, since they allow me to test code without having to have every intricate detail finished. It makes sense for confirming methods got used, and that a specific path through the program is being followed. Stubs can’t do everything, you can’t really test complex operations on a piece of code that doesn’t work, but for basic probing and testing, I could see myself using stubs a lot more often. It feels like one of those things that I could have used before without thinking about it, which makes sense, as I am the kind of programmer who likes taking things one step at a time, and making sure one piece works before moving on to the next. But now that I have a name connected to the action, I really appreciate it as a tool that will play a big role in my programming career going forward.

 

 Link to the blog post in question: https://medium.com/@fideraphael/a-comprehensive-guide-to-stub-and-mock-testing-unveiling-the-essence-of-effective-software-testing-7f7817e3eab4

 

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Testing and Testing (One of them is a Fake).

 Hello!

This week in class we’ve been discussing testing using fakes, more specifically with Stubs. Our first assignment this week told us about the different kinds of fakes used in testing, which I found a little confusing at first, since I would have liked to have seen a more literal example of all the different variants. That is why, for the sake of improving my knowledge on the subject going forward, since this is something we’ll be talking about, I decided to do some reading on stubs and mocks, from a blog post written by Raphael F. on Medium. 

The article spoke at length about the differences between mocks and stubs, and gave some meaningful examples of both. I appreciated the use of diagrams in the article, as it shows what each of them interacts with and how (i.e. A stub doesn’t interact with a database, and is instead a hard-coded value to be grabbed for testing). That wasn’t something that was immediately obvious to me in the assignments, and during our assignment on Stubs specifically it began to make more sense, but I appreciate the way the article laid out the concept in plain text, and made it easier to understand. I also liked that the blog post went over real world applications for each of the fake types, such a using stubs for read/write actions to keep the code and files separate, or using mocks for API testing. Admittedly I am still a little hazy on mocks, but I think by the time we go over it in class, it will all make sense.

 In closing, I really do value stubs as valuable pieces of testing equipment, since they allow me to test code without having to have every intricate detail finished. It makes sense for confirming methods got used, and that a specific path through the program is being followed. Stubs can’t do everything, you can’t really test complex operations on a piece of code that doesn’t work, but for basic probing and testing, I could see myself using stubs a lot more often. It feels like one of those things that I could have used before without thinking about it, which makes sense, as I am the kind of programmer who likes taking things one step at a time, and making sure one piece works before moving on to the next. But now that I have a name connected to the action, I really appreciate it as a tool that will play a big role in my programming career going forward.

 

 Link to the blog post in question: https://medium.com/@fideraphael/a-comprehensive-guide-to-stub-and-mock-testing-unveiling-the-essence-of-effective-software-testing-7f7817e3eab4

 

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.

Testing and Testing (One of them is a Fake).

 Hello!

This week in class we’ve been discussing testing using fakes, more specifically with Stubs. Our first assignment this week told us about the different kinds of fakes used in testing, which I found a little confusing at first, since I would have liked to have seen a more literal example of all the different variants. That is why, for the sake of improving my knowledge on the subject going forward, since this is something we’ll be talking about, I decided to do some reading on stubs and mocks, from a blog post written by Raphael F. on Medium. 

The article spoke at length about the differences between mocks and stubs, and gave some meaningful examples of both. I appreciated the use of diagrams in the article, as it shows what each of them interacts with and how (i.e. A stub doesn’t interact with a database, and is instead a hard-coded value to be grabbed for testing). That wasn’t something that was immediately obvious to me in the assignments, and during our assignment on Stubs specifically it began to make more sense, but I appreciate the way the article laid out the concept in plain text, and made it easier to understand. I also liked that the blog post went over real world applications for each of the fake types, such a using stubs for read/write actions to keep the code and files separate, or using mocks for API testing. Admittedly I am still a little hazy on mocks, but I think by the time we go over it in class, it will all make sense.

 In closing, I really do value stubs as valuable pieces of testing equipment, since they allow me to test code without having to have every intricate detail finished. It makes sense for confirming methods got used, and that a specific path through the program is being followed. Stubs can’t do everything, you can’t really test complex operations on a piece of code that doesn’t work, but for basic probing and testing, I could see myself using stubs a lot more often. It feels like one of those things that I could have used before without thinking about it, which makes sense, as I am the kind of programmer who likes taking things one step at a time, and making sure one piece works before moving on to the next. But now that I have a name connected to the action, I really appreciate it as a tool that will play a big role in my programming career going forward.

 

 Link to the blog post in question: https://medium.com/@fideraphael/a-comprehensive-guide-to-stub-and-mock-testing-unveiling-the-essence-of-effective-software-testing-7f7817e3eab4

 

 

From the blog Camille's Cluttered Closet by Camille and used with permission of the author. All other rights reserved by the author.