How to create meaningful unit tests for fakes - c#

I understand the basics on how to unit test, however I often struggle at finding what meaningful things to test. I believe I have to create a fake implementation and inject into the consumer. I have a service class responsible to subscribing to (using Exchange Web Services (EWS)) Exchange 2010 requesting updates on new mail. In order to decouple my subscribing implementation from the service itself I decided to inject the implementation in the service. Below is what I currently have. I've omitted code dealing specifically communicating with Exchange.
// Not a big fan of having two identical interfaces...
public interface IStreamingNotificationService
{
void Subscribe();
}
public interface IExchangeService
{
void Subscribe();
}
public class StreamingNotificationService : IStreamingNotificationService
{
private readonly IExchangeService _exchangeService;
public StreamingNotificationService(IExchangeService exchangeService)
{
if (exchangeService == null)
{
throw new ArgumentNullException("exchangeService");
}
_exchangeService = exchangeService;
}
public void Subscribe()
{
_exchangeService.Subscribe();
}
}
public class ExchangeServiceImpl : IExchangeService
{
private readonly INetworkConfiguration _networkConfiguration;
private ExchangeService ExchangeService { get; set; }
public ExchangeServiceImpl(INetworkConfiguration networkConfiguration)
{
if (networkConfiguration == null)
{
throw new ArgumentNullException("networkConfiguration");
}
_networkConfiguration = networkConfiguration;
// Set up EWS
}
public void Subscribe()
{
// Subscribe for new mail notifications.
}
}
More specifically, how do I create a meaningful unit test to ensure subscribing works the way it should?

Usually you would use a mocking framework to create a fake exchange and test on this object that Subscribe was indeed called. I usually use Rhino Mocks, and your test would look e.g. like this (there are many ways to implement it):
[Test]
public void SubscribesToExchange()
{
var exchange = MockRepository.GenerateMock<IExchangeService>(); //this is the stub
var service = StreamingNotificationService(exchange); //this is the object we are testing
service.Subscribe();
service.AssertWasCalled(x => x.Subscribe(););
}

Decoupling and injection is always a very good idea in terms of unittesting.
Now you can easily test your StreamingNotificationService class. All you have to do is to test is if construction behaves nice, and if subscribemethod calls your injected (and fake) IExchangeService.

Related

Unit testing database using EF

How does one unit test a service which connects to a database?
I have a playerRepository class in data access layer, which interacts with the database directly, and a playerService class in business layer which creates an instance of playerRepository and services random stuff like - deleting player, saving player, getting all players, getting the player by id/name yadda yadda.
I want to unit test the playerService without using the real database, but using in-memory database provided with EF.
The problem is, I'm having trouble figuring out how to set it up.
I have a PlayerContext : DbContext class, which is used as a model to code-first (done this part via tutorial on EF). And I have to add a parameter to constructor DbContextOptionsBuilder<PlayerContext>, but I don't know where to begin. I don't know how and where to setup the connection string, where does the "default" database store itself.
I want to do this by using EF without NSubstitute or Moq, I'm doing this to learn how it's done without using other frameworks except for EF.
public class PlayerContext : DbContext
{
public PlayerContext() : base()
{
}
public DbSet<Player> Players { get; set; }
}
public class Player
{
public string Id { get; set; }
public string FirstName { get; set; }
public string LastName { get; set; }
public int DciNumber { get; set; }
}
I'm using visual studio provided unit testing
[TestClass]
public class PlayerServiceTest
{
// Should get all the players from database
[TestMethod]
public void GetAllPlayers()
{
// arrange - act
// TODO: Return all the players from the database
// assert
// TODO: Should return empty list
}
And the PlayerService class looks something like this
public class PlayerService
{
private PlayerRepository _playerRepository = new PlayerRepository();
public List<Player> GetAllPlayers()
{
var players = _playerRepository.GetAllPlayers();
return players;
}
PlayerRepository
public class PlayerRepository
{
public List<Player> GetAllPlayers()
{
using (var context = new PlayerContext())
{
var players = context.Players.ToList();
return players;
}
}
Generally my questions are:
How to make the PlayerContext with another connection string which connects to in-memory database in case of unit test, and also how to provide it with the correct connection string when not running via unit-tests
How to change the location of the database, because it's using a default path in C:\Users.
I'm not looking for integration tests with the DAL's PlayerRepository, I just want to test the business layer and all I need is, when I run the tests that the PlayerService to uses the PlayerRepository which connects to in-memory database and that's it. Otherwise it should connect to the local db stored in the same folder as the main exe for the app
Help needed!
The missing piece is dependency injection / IoC. The principle here is to define your dependencies (Repository) with a contract interface that can be mocked out. Inject that dependency into the classes that depend on it. This way you can substitute out concrete implementations like databases, file handling, etc. with mock up objects that return a known state, throw an expected exception, etc. to test your business logic's handling of those scenarios.
public class PlayerService
{
private readonly IPlayerRepository _playerRepository = null;
public PlayerService(IPlayerRepository playerRepository)
{
_playerRepository = playerRepository ?? throw new ArgumentNullException("playerRepository");
}
public List<Player> GetAllPlayers()
{
var players = _playerRepository.GetAllPlayers();
return players;
}
}
Have a look at IoC containers such as Autofac, Unity, Ninject, etc. for examples of how a container can be st up to automatically identify and inject concrete class instances into your services when it constructs them.
When you go to write a unit test you create a mock of the IPlayerRepository class (see: Moq for example) and pass that to your service under test. I.e.:
[Test]
public void TestService()
{
var mockRepository = new Mock<IPlayerRepository>();
mockRepository.Setup(x => x.GetPlayers()).Returns(buildTestPlayerList());
var serviceUnderTest = new PlayerService(mockRepository.Object);
// continue with test...
}
At a worst case: if you want to forgo the container, this can work as well:
public class PlayerService
{
private IPlayerRepository _playerRepository = null;
public IPlayerRepository PlayerRepository
{
get { return _playerRepository ?? (_playerRepository = new PlayerRepository()); }
set { _playerRepository = value; }
}
// ...
}
... and then with the test...
[Test]
public void TestService()
{
var mockRepository = new Mock<IPlayerRepository>();
mockRepository.Setup(x => x.GetPlayers()).Returns(buildTestPlayerList());
var serviceUnderTest = new PlayerService { PlayerRepository = mockRepository.Object };
// continue with test...
}
This is a pattern I call "lazy property injection" where you can opt to send a dependency in, but by default it will simply create the default dependency. This can be a useful pattern when introducing dependency substitution & unit testing into legacy code that was relying heavily on newing up classes mid-code. It's lazy in the sense that the dependency is only "newed" the first time it is accessed. If you call a method in the service that doesn't need the dependency then there is no initialization of every dependency, only the ones that are used. I highly recommend reading up on IoC containers though since they help automate wiring up dependencies.

Mock service without interfaces using rhino mocks

Background
My application is consuming a WCF service via proxyies. I have to unit test my implementation, that it consume the service and processing are done correctly.
Method to be Tested
public class MyClass
{
private ManagerServiceClientImpl myclient;
public void MethodToBeTested();
{
var result = GetServiceData();
if(result!=null)
//some processing
}
}
private MyObject GetServiceData()
{
myclient = ServiceLocator.Current.GetInstance<ManagerServiceClientImpl>();
if(myclient.ConnectToService() && myclient.MyServiceClient.IsConnected)
return myclient.GetData();
else
return null;
}
This is provided by external source, so I have no right to modify it
public class ManagerServiceClientImpl
{
public ServiceClient MyServiceClient { get; private set; }
public bool ConnectToService()
}
How would I mock the ManagerServiceClientImpl it doesn't have interface or methods are not marked as virtual
What i tried so far.
[TestMethod]
public void IsServiceConnected_GetData()
{
//Arrange
ManagerServiceClientImpl clientImpl =
MockRepository.GenerateMock<ManagerServiceClientImpl>();
ServiceLocator.Expect(x => x.GetInstance<ManagerServiceClientImpl>())
.Return(clientImpl);
var testData= new MyObject
{
ID = "Test1",
Name ="test",
}
//Act
_myClass.MethodToBeTested();
//Assert
stubService.AssertWasCalled(h => h.SaveAllChanges());
}
Note: Using Rhino.Mocks. Its my first time using Rhino mocks
As Amittai Shapira mentioned you can mock it without an interface by using unit testing frameworks that support it, i'm using Typemock Isolator and i created an example test for your code:
I've created an instance of MyClass and used a feature of Typemock to mock Non-Public methods to change the return value for GetServiceData
[TestMethod]
public void TestMethod1()
{
var testData = new MyObject
{
ID = "Test1",
Name = "test",
};
var realObj = new MyClass();
Isolate.NonPublic.WhenCalled(realObj, "GetServiceData").WillReturn(testData);
Isolate.NonPublic.WhenCalled(realObj, "SaveAllChanges").CallOriginal();
realObj.MethodToBeTested();
Isolate.Verify.NonPublic.WasCalled(realObj, "SaveAllChanges");
}
In order to use RhinoMocks (or Moq, or any other "constrained" mocking framework), the type you are mocking must support inheritance on the members you want to mock. This means it must either be an interface, or the members must be virtual/abstract. Without that, these frameworks cannot do what they need to do to generate a proxy middle-man at runtime. For more details, see my blog post on how .NET mocking frameworks work under the hood: https://www.wrightfully.com/how-net-mocking-frameworks-work
What you could do is create methods in your own class that wrap the other service such that you could mock your methods and have them return whatever you need, completely bypassing the service.

Limit Ninject.MockingKernel to mocking classes in my own namespaces only

I've just switched to using the NInject.MockingKernel extension for my tests (NSubstitute).
However, it makes very hard to run my Web API integration tests because it will return mocks for all Web API interfaces also.
Can I automatically limit its application only to namespaces of my own?
I don't see how that is possible out of the box. Although it's not very hard to create such a kernel on your own.
This sample is of course very minimalistic though, but it should show you how it could be done. Or maybe there is someone with more knowledge of the Ninject internals.
public class NamespaceFilteringMockMissingBindingsResolver : MockMissingBindingResolver
{
public NamespaceFilteringMockMissingBindingsResolver(IMockProviderCallbackProvider mockProviderCallbackProvider)
: base(mockProviderCallbackProvider)
{
}
protected override bool TypeIsInterfaceOrAbstract(Type service)
{
return base.TypeIsInterfaceOrAbstract(service) && service.Namespace != null && service.Namespace.StartsWith("YourNamespace");
}
}
public class CustomNSubstituteMockingKernel : NSubstituteMockingKernel
{
public CustomNSubstituteMockingKernel()
{
this.AddComponents();
}
public CustomNSubstituteMockingKernel(INinjectSettings settings, params INinjectModule[] modules)
: base(settings, modules)
{
this.AddComponents();
}
private new void AddComponents()
{
this.Components.RemoveAll<IMissingBindingResolver>();
this.Components.Add<IMissingBindingResolver, SingletonSelfBindingResolver>();
this.Components.Add<IMissingBindingResolver, NamespaceFilteringMockMissingBindingsResolver>();
}
}
Update
You are right, you don't need to create your own kernel. You can also do it like this.
var kernel = new NSubstituteMockingKernel();
kernel.Components.RemoveAll<IMissingBindingResolver>();
kernel.Components.Add<IMissingBindingResolver, SingletonSelfBindingResolver>();
kernel.Components.Add<IMissingBindingResolver, NamespaceFilteringMockMissingBindingsResolver>();
Creating your own kernel might just be more handy than always writing those extra lines. Or you create some kind of factory method.

Dependency Injection Architectural Design - Service classes circular references

I have the following service classes:
public class JobService {
private UserService us;
public JobService (UserService us) {
this.us = us;
}
public void addJob(Job job) {
// needs to make a call to user service to update some user info
// similar dependency to the deleteUser method
}
}
public class UserService {
private JobService js;
public UserService(JobService js) {
this.js = js;
}
public void deleteUser(User u) {
using (TransactionScope scope = new TransactionScope()) {
List<IJob> jobs = jobService.findAllByUser(u.Id);
foreach (IJob job in jobs) {
js.deleteJob(job);
}
userDao.delete(user);
scope.Complete();
}
}
}
Each of these service classes is getting instantiated by IoC container, and there is not a functional problem, but this to me feels like there is a potential design flaw in this approach and I'm wondering if there's an alternative approach that makes more sense.
As someone already pointed out, the problem is not with limitations to the DI container but with your design.
I see the reason that you have a separate UserService and a JobService which contain a reference to each other. This is because both UserService and JobService contain some logic that needs the other service as a reference (adding a job requires adding a user, etc.). However, I think that you should NOT reference one service from the other. Rather, you should have another layer of abstraction behind the services which the services will use for the common logic. So, the services will contain the logic which can't(shouldn't) be reused and the helpers will contain the shared logic.
For example:
public class UserHelper{
//add all your common methods here
}
public class JobService {
private UserHelper us;
public JobService (UserHelper us) {
this.us = us;
}
public void addJob(Job job) {
// calls helper class
}
}
public class UserService {
public UserService(UserHelper js) {
this.js = js;
}
public void deleteUser(User u) {
// calls helper class
}
}
In this way, you won't have any issues with circular references and you will have one place which contains the logic which needs to be reused by different services.
Also, I prefer having services which are completely isolated from one another.
The problem you are having has in fact nothing to do with the limitations of your DI container, but it is a general problem. Even without any container, it will be impossible to create those types:
var job = new JobService([what goes here???]);
var user = new UserService(job);
The general answer is therefore to promote one of the dependencies to a property. This will break the dependency cycle:
var job = new JobService();
var user = new UserService(job);
// Use property injection
job.User = user;
Prevent however from using more properties than strictly needed. These dependency cycles should be pretty rare and makes it much harder to either wire your types together, or to validate the DI configuration for correctness. Constructor injection makes this much more easy.
You can decouple the services by using events. Instead of calling a dependent method of another service when an action has been performed, an event is raised. An integrator can then wire up the services through the events. A service does not even know the existence of the other service.
public class JobService
{
public event Action<User, Job> JobAdded;
public void AddJob(User user, Job job)
{
//TODO: Add job.
// Fire event
if (JobAdded != null) JobAdded(user, job);
}
internal void DeleteJobs(int userID)
{
//TODO: Delete jobs
}
}
public class UserService
{
public event Action<User> UserDeleted;
public void DeleteUser(User u)
{
//TODO: Delete User.
// Fire event
if (UserDeleted != null) UserDeleted(u);
}
public void UpdateUser(User user, Job job)
{
//TODO: Update user
}
}
The integrator wires up the services
public static class Services
{
public static JobService JobService { get; private set; }
public static UserService UserService { get; private set; }
static Services( )
{
JobService = new JobService();
UserService = new UserService();
JobService.JobAdded += JobService_JobAdded;
UserService.UserDeleted += UserService_UserDeleted;
}
private static void UserService_UserDeleted(User user)
{
JobService.DeleteJobs(user.ID);
}
private static void JobService_JobAdded(User user, Job job)
{
UserService.UpdateUser(user, job);
}
}
(Note: I simplified event raising a bit. It's not thread safe like this. But you can assume that the events are subscribed in advance and will not be changed later.)
This wont work in Autofac. See circular dependencies section of the documentation.
Constructor/Constructor Dependencies Two types with circular
constructor dependencies are not supported. You will get an exception
when you try to resolve types registered in this manner.
You could potentially use relationship types (Func<>, Lazy<>) to break the cycle.
Your code is a bit too generic to come up with a proper solution but you should consider changing the direction of dependencies regardless of what IoC container you use.
public class JobService {
private UserService us;
public JobService (UserService us) {
this.us = us;
}
public void addJob(Job job) {
// needs to make a call to user service to update some user info
}
}
public class UserService {
private JobService js;
public UserService(Func<JobService> jsFactory) {
this.js = jsFactory(this);
}
public void deleteUser(User u) {
// needs to call the job service to delete all the user's jobs
}
}
Alternatively, In the case of your example you could move deleteUser and create a method, delete all jobs on the job service and instead of refering to the user use an id. this breaks the dependency by using the id.
Another alternative is to pass the job service as a parameter to deleteUser.

Mock implementation for use in automatic UI testing

I am working on adding basic automatic UI tests to the block of unit tests we run with each nightly build. We used MSTest coded UI and created a script.
The code-behind is dependent upon IClientManager which both the real manager and mock implement.
My problem is that I don't know how to switch automatically between the real and mock implementations inside the button click handler, when running a test.
My two other constraints are that I can't have a dependency on the mock assembly in the code-behind and that I can't use a DI framework, since the client is "security conscious" and getting a framework approved might take months.
Is there any way of doing this manually, and hopefully, not a bigger problem than the problem I am looking to solve?
Thank you!
You could build your own simple object container if you can't use a third party one (which is silly but I understand, I've been there before)
here is something that I whipped up that could get you started... haven't tested it and it is really rough, but hopefully you get the idea
public static class ObjectFactory
{
static IDictionary<Type, object> _factory = new Dictionary<Type, object>();
public static void Register<T>(Func<T> builder)
{
if (_factory.ContainsKey(typeof(T)))
_factory[typeof(T)] = builder;
else
_factory.Add(typeof(T), builder);
}
public static T GetInstance<T>()
{
if (_factory.ContainsKey(typeof(T)))
throw new ArgumentException(string.Format("Type <{0}> not registered in ObjectFactory", typeof(T).Name));
return ((Func<T>)_factory[typeof(T)])();
}
}
public interface IClientManager { }
public class RealClientManager : IClientManager { }
public class MockClientManager : IClientManager { }
public class MyView
{
public MyView()
{
// probably better to do this registry in some sort of application initialization
ObjectFactory.Register<IClientManager>(() => new RealClientManager());
}
public void SomeMethodThatNeedsClientManager()
{
var clientManager = ObjectFactory.GetInstance<IClientManager>();
}
}
public class MyTester
{
[TestMethod()]
public void SomeTest()
{
var view = new MyView();
// swap the client manager in the test
ObjectFactory.Register<IClientManager>(() => new MockClientManager());
// Asserts
}
}
you can see that if you've used StructureMap or some other DI container before they do a lot of the same thing with a lot of added niceties such as traversing your object graph and registering objects automatically based on conventions, managing object lifecycles, scoping of containers, etc... a lot of this stuff you could implement yourself too... but you should just really used a tried and true solution such as StructureMap

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