The tests at my new job are nothing like the tests I have encountered before.
When they're writing their unit tests (presumably before the code), they create a class starting with "When". The name describes the scenario under which the tests will run (the fixture). They'll created subclasses for each branch through the code. All of the tests within the class start with "should" and they test different aspects of the code after running. So, they will have a method for verifying that each mock (DOC) is called correctly and for checking the return value, if applicable. I am a little confused by this method because it means the exact same execution code is being run for each test and this seems wasteful. I was wondering if there is a technique similar to this that they may have adapted. A link explaining the style and how it is supposed to be implemented would be great. I sounds similar to some approaches of BDD I've seen.
I also noticed that they've moved the repeated calls to "execute" the SUT into the setup methods. This causes issues when they are expecting exceptions, because they can't use built-in tools for performing the check (Python unittest's assertRaises). This also means storing the return value as a backing field of the test class. They also have to store many of the mocks as backing fields. Across class hierarchies it becomes difficult to tell the configuration of each mock.
They also test code a little differently. It really comes down to what they consider an integration test. They mock out anything that steals the context away from the function being tested. This can mean private methods within the same class. I have always limited mocking to resources that can affect the results of the test, such as databases, the file system or dates. I can see some value in this approach. However, the way it is being used now, I can see it leading to fragile tests (tests that break with every code change). I get concerned because without an integration test, in this case, you could be using a 3rd party API incorrectly but your unit tests would still pass. I'd like to learn more about this approach as well.
So, any resources about where to learn more about some of these approaches would be nice. I'd hate to pass up a great learning opportunity just because I don't understand they way they are doing things. I would also like to stop focusing on the negatives of these approaches and see where the benefits come in.
If I understood you explanation in the first paragraph correctly, that's quite similar to what I often do. (Depending on whether the testing framework makes it easy or not. Also many mocking frameworks don't support it, but spy frameworks like Mockito do better.)
For example see the stack example here which has a common setup (adding things to the stack) and then a bunch of independent tests which each check one thing. Here's still another example, this time one where none of the tests (#Test) modify the common fixture (#Before), but each of them focuses on checking just one independent thing that should happen. If the tests are very well focused, then it should be possible to change the production code to make any single test fail while all other tests pass (I wrote about that recently in Unit Test Focus Isolation).
The main idea is to have each test check a single feature/behavior, so that when tests fail it's easier to find out why it failed. See this TDD tutorial for more examples and to learn that style.
I'm not worried about the same code paths executed multiple times, when it takes a millisecond to run one test (if it takes more than a couple of seconds to run all unit tests, the tests are probably too big). From your explanation I'm more worried that the tests might be too tightly coupled to the implementation, instead of the feature, if it's systematic that there is one test for each mock. The name of the test would be a good indicator of how well structured or how fragile the tests are - does it describe a feature or how that feature is implemented.
About mocking, a good book to read is Growing Object-Oriented Software Guided by Tests. One should not mock 3rd party APIs (APIs which you don't own and can't modify), for the reason you already mentioned, but one should create an abstraction over it which better fits the needs of the system using it and works the way you want it. That abstraction needs to be integration tested with the 3rd party API, but in all tests using the abstraction you can mock it.
First, the pattern that you are using is based on Cucumber - here's a link. The style is from the BDD (Behavior-driven development) approach. It has two advantages over traditional TDD:
Language - one of the tenants of BDD is that the language you use influences the thoughts you have by forcing you to speak in the language of the end user, you will end up writing different tests than when you write tests from the focus of a programmer
Tests lock code - BDD locks the code at the appropriate level. One problem common in testing is that you write a large number of tests, which makes your codebase more brittle as when you change the code you must also change a large number of tests too. BDD forces you to lock the behavior of your code, rather than the implementation of your code. This way, when a test breaks, it is more likely to be meaningful.
It is worth noting that you do not have to use the Cucumber style of testing to achieve these affects and using it does add an extra layer of overhead. But very few programmers have been successful in keeping the BDD mindset while using traditional xUnit tools (TDD).
It also sounds like you have some scenarios where you would like to say 'When I do , then verify '. Because the current BDD xUnit frameworks only allow you to verify primitives (strings, ints, doubles, booleans....), this usually results in a large number of individual tests (one for each Assert). It is possible to do more complicated verifications using a Golden Master paradigm test tool, such as ApprovalTests. Here's a video example of this.
Finally, here's a link to Dan North's blog - he started it all.
I would like to start doing more unit testing in my applications, but it seems to me that most of the stuff I do is just no suitable to be unit tested. I know how unit tests are supposed to work in textbook examples, but in real world applications they do not seem of much use.
Some applications I write have very simple logic and complex interactions with things that are outside my control. For instance I would like to write a daemon which reacts to signals sent by some applications, and changes some user settings in the OS. I can see three difficulties:
first I have to be able to talk with the applications and be notified of their events;
then I need to interact with OS whenever I receive a signal, in order to change the appropriate user settings;
finally all of this should work as a daemon.
All these things are potentially delicate: I will have to browse possibly complex APIs and I may introduce bugs, say by misinterpreting some parameters. What can unit testing do for me? I can mock both the external application and the OS, and check that given a signal from the application, I will call the appropriate API method on the OS. This is... well, the trivial part of the application.
Actually most of the things I do involve interaction with databases, the filesystem or other applications, and these are the most delicate parts.
For another example look at my build tool PHPmake. I would like to refactor it, as it is not very well-written, but I fear to do this as I have no tests. So I would like to add some. The point is that the things which may be broken by refactoring may not be caught by unit tests:
One of things to do is deciding which things are to be built and which one are already up to date, and this depends on the time of last modification of the files. This time is actually changed by external processes, when some build command is fired.
I want to be sure that the output of external processes is displayed correctly. Sometimes the buikd commands require some input, and that should be also managed correctly. But I do not know a priori which processes will be ran - it may be anything.
Some logic is involved in pattern matching, and this may seem to be testable part. But the functions which do the pattern matching use (ni addition to their own logic) the PHP function glob, which works with the filesystem. If I just mock a tree in place of the actual filesystem, glob will not work.
I could go on with more examples, but the point is the following. Unless I have some delicate algorithms, most of what I do involves interaction with external resources, and this is not suitable for unit testing. More that this, often this interaction is actually the non-trivial part. Still many people see unit testing as a basic tool. What am I missing? How can I learn be a better tester?
I think you open a number of issues in your question.
Firstly, when your application integrates with external environments such as OS, other threads, etc. then you have to separate (1) the logic that is tied in with the external enviroment and (2) your business-code.. that is, the stuff your application does. This is no different to how you would separate GUI and SERVER in an application (or web application).
Secondly, you ask if you should test simple logic. I'd say, it depends. Often simple fetch/store functionality is nice to have tests for. It's like the foundation of your application.. hence its important. Other business stuff built upon your foundation that is very simple, you may easily find yourself both feeling that you are wasting your time, and mostly you are :-)
Thirdly, refactory an existing program and testing it in its existing state may be a problem. If your PHP program produces a set of files on the basis of some input, well, maybe thats your entry point to tests are. Sure the tests may be high-level, but it's an easy way to ensure that after the refactoring, your program produces the same output. Hence, aim for higher-level tests in that situation in the start phase of your refactoring efforts.
I'd like to recommend some literature, but I can only come up with one title. "Working Effectively with Legacy Code" By Micheal Feathers. It's a good start. Another would be "xUnit Test Patterns: Refactoring Test Code" by Gerard Meszaros (although that book is much more sloppy and FULL of copy paste text).
As regards your issue about existing code bases that aren't currently covered by tests in which you would like to start refactoring, I would suggest reading:
Working Effectively with Legacy Code By Micheal Feathers.
That book gives you techniques on how to deal with the issues you might be facing with PHPMake. It provides ways to introduce seams for testing, where there previously weren't any.
Additionally, with code that touches say the file systems, you can abstract the file system calls behind a thin wrapper, using the Adapter Pattern. The unit tests would be against a fake implementation of the abstract interface that the wrapping class implements.
At some point you get to a low enough level where a unit of code can't be isolated for unit testing as these depend on library or API calls (such as in the production implementation of the wrapper). Once this happens integration tests are really the only automated developer tests you can write.
I recommend this google tech-talk on unit testing.
The video boils down to
write your code so that it knows as little about how it will be used as possible. The less assumptions your code makes, the easier it is to test. Avoid complex logic in constructors, the use of singletons, static class members, and so on.
isolate your code from the external world (comms, databases, real time), and make sure that your code only talks to your isolation layer. Otherwise, writing tests will be a nightmare in terms of 'fake environment' setup.
unit tests should test stories; that is what we really understand and care for; given a class with a method foo(), testFoo() is uninformative. They actually recommend test names like itShouldCloseConnectionEvenWhenExceptionThrown(). Ideally, your stories should cover enough functionality that you can rebuild the spec from the stories.
NOTE: the video and this post use Java as an example; however, the main points stand for any language.
"Unit tests" tests one unit of your code. No external tools should be involved. This seems to be complicated for your first app (without knowing to much about it ;)) but the phpMake is unit-testable - I'm sure ... because ant, gradle and maven are unit-testable too ;)!
But of course you can test your first application automated too. There are several different layers one could test an application.
So the task for you is to find an automated way to test your app - be it integration testing or whatever.
E.g. you could write shell scripts, which asserts some output! With that you make sure your application behaves correctly ...
Tests of interactions with external resources are integration tests, not unit tests.
Tests of your code to see how it would behave if particular external interactions had occurred can be unit tests. These should be done by writing your code to use dependency injection, and then, in the unit test, injecting mock objects as dependencies.
For example, consider a piece of code that adds the results of a call to one service to the results of a call to another service:
public int AddResults(IService1 svc1, IService2 svc2, int parameter)
{
return svc1.Call(parameter) + svc2.Call(parameter);
}
You can test this by passing in mock objects for the two services:
private class Service1Returns1 : IService1
{
public int Call(int parameter){return 1;}
}
private class Service2Returns1 : IService2
{
public int Call(int parameter){return 1;}
}
public void Test1And1()
{
Assert.AreEqual(2, AddResults(new Service1Returns1(), new Service2Returns1(), 0));
}
First of all, if unit testing doesn't seem like it would be much use in your applications, why do you even want to start doing more of it? What is motivating you to care about it? It is definitely a waste of time if a) you do everything perfect the first time and nothing ever changes or b) you decide it's a waste of time and do it poorly.
If you do think that you really want to do unit testing, the answer to your questions are all the same: encapsulation. In your daemon example, you could create a ApplcationEventObeservationProxy with a very narrow interface that just implements pass through methods. The purpose of this class is to do nothing but completely encapsulate the rest of your code from the third-party event observing library (nothing means nothing -- no logic here). Do the same thing for OS settings. Then you can completely unit test the class that does actions based on events. I'd recommend have a separate class for the daemon-ness that just wraps your main class -- it will make the testing easier.
There are a couple of benefits to this approach outside of unit testing. One is that if you encapsulate the code that interacts directly with the OS, it's easier to switch it out. This kind of code is particularly prone to breakage outside of your control (i.e., MS patchsets). You will also probably want to support more than one OS, and if the OS specific logic is not tangled with the rest of your logic, it will be easier. The other benefit is that you'll be forced to realize that there is more business logic in your app than you think. :)
Finally, don't forget that unit testing is a foundation for a good product, but not the only ingredient. Having a set of tests that explore and verify the OS API calls you'll be using is a good strategy for the "hard" parts of this problem. You should also have end to end tests that ensure the events in your applications cause the OS setting changes.
As other answers suggested Working Effectively with Legacy Code By Micheal Feathers is a good read. If you have to deal with legacy code, and you want to make sure that the systems interaction work as expected, try writing integration tests first. And then it is more appropriate to write Unit Tests to test the behaviour of methods that are valued from the requirements point of view. You Tests serve a whole different purpose than the integration tests. Unit Tests are more likely to improve the design of your system than testing how everything hangs to gather.
I am looking for rules like:
A test is not a unit-test if:
it communicates with a database
it cannot run in parallel with other tests
uses the "environment" like registry or file system
What else is there?
See Michael Feathers' definition
A test is not a unit test if:
It talks to the database
It communicates across the network
It touches the file system
It can't run at the same time as any of your other unit tests
You have to do special things to your environment (such as editing
config files) to run it.
A test is not a unit test if it is not testing a unit.
Seriously, that's all there is to it.
The concept of "unit" in unit testing is not well-defined, in fact, the best definition I have found so far, isn't actually a definition because it is circular: a unit in a unit test is the smallest possible thing that can be tested in isolation.
This gives you two checkpoints: is it tested in isolation? And is it the smallest possible thing?
Please note that both of these are context-dependent. What might be the smallest possible thing in one situation (say, an entire object) might in another situation just one small piece of one single method. And what counts as isolation in one situation might be in another (e.g. in a memory-managed language, you never run in isolation from the garbage collector, and most of the time that is irrelevant, but sometimes it might not be).
Difficult one...
For me a unit test verifies one specific piece of logic in isolation. Meaning, I take some logic, extract it from the rest (if necessary by mocking dependencies) and test just that logic - a unit (of the whole) - by exploring different kind of possible control flows.
But on the other side...can we always 100% say correct or incorrect?? Not to become philosophical, but - as also Michael says in his post:
Tests that do these things aren't bad.
Often they are worth writing, and they
can be written in a unit test harness.
However, it is important to be able to
separate them from true unit tests so
that we can keep a set of tests that
we can run fast whenever we make our
changes.
So why shouldn't I write a unit test that verifies the logic of parsing for instance an xls file by accessing some dummy file from the file system in my test folder (like MS tests allow with the DeploymentItem)?
Of course - as mentioned - we should separate these kind of tests from the others (maybe in a separate test suite in JUnit). But I think one should also write those tests if he feels comfortable in having them there...clearly then always again remembering that a unit test should just test a piece in isolation.
What is most important in my eyes is that these tests run fast and don't take too long s.t. they can be run repeatedly and very often.
It has no asserts, and is not expecting an exception to be thrown.
A test is not an Unit Test when:
it tests more than one thing at once (i.e. it tests how two things work together) - then it is an integration test
Checklist for good unit tests:
they are automated
they are repeatable
they are easy to implement
they remain for future use, once written
they can be run by anyone
they can be run by the push of a button
they run quickly
Some more best practices (in no particular order of importance):
tests should be separated from integration tests (which are slower), so that they can be run fast as frequently as possible
they should not comprise too much logic (preferably, no control structures)
every test should test only one thing (thus, they should contain only one assert)
the expected values used in assertions should be hard-coded and not computed at test run-time
external dependencies (filesystem, time, memory etc.) should be replaced by stubs
test should recreate the initial state at test shutdown
in assertions, it is better to use a "contains..." policy, rather than "is strictly equal..." policy (i.e. we expect certain values in a collection, certain characters in a string etc.)
This is part of the knowledge I have extracted from Roy Osherove's book - The Art of Unit Testing
Implementing a test across multiple possibly failing units would not be a unit test.
Intricate question.
Say I am to program some business logic and all business logic needs to get to the data via some form of DAL.
Say that for the purposes of testing, I mock the DAL units (by creating "mockingbirds").
But those mockingbirds are of course, additional units in their own right. So even when using mocks, it might seem like I'm still bound to violate the idea of "no other units involved" when I want to unit-test my business logic module.
Of course, it is generally known that "creating mockingbirds for the DAL" can invalidate your very test itself on the count that your mockingbird deviates in some particular aspect from the DAL.
Conclusion : it is outright impossible to do "genuine unit-tests" on business modules that depend in any way on any kind of DAL, question mark ?
Corrolary : the only thing that can possible be ("genuinely" !) unit-tested is the DAL itself, question mark ?
Corrolary of the corrolary : given that the "DAL" is usually either an ORM or the very DML of some DBMS, and given that those products are usually bought as being "proven technology", what is the added value of doing any unit tests what so ever, question mark ?
After whether a test is a unit test or not is settled the next question is, is it a good unit test?
I know the so-called textbook definition of unit tests and integration tests. What I am curious about is when it is time to write unit tests... I will write them to cover as many sets of classes as possible.
For example, if I have a Word class, I will write some unit tests for the Word class. Then, I begin writing my Sentence class, and when it needs to interact with the Word class, I will often write my unit tests such that they test both Sentence and Word... at least in the places where they interact.
Have these tests essentially become integration tests because they now test the integration of these 2 classes, or is it just a unit test that spans 2 classes?
In general, because of this uncertain line, I will rarely actually write integration tests... or is my using the finished product to see if all the pieces work properly the actual integration tests, even though they are manual and rarely repeated beyond the scope of each individual feature?
Am I misunderstanding integration tests, or is there really just very little difference between integration and unit tests?
The key difference, to me, is that integration tests reveal if a feature is working or is broken, since they stress the code in a scenario close to reality. They invoke one or more software methods or features and test if they act as expected.
On the opposite, a Unit test testing a single method relies on the (often wrong) assumption that the rest of the software is correctly working, because it explicitly mocks every dependency.
Hence, when a unit test for a method implementing some feature is green, it does not mean the feature is working.
Say you have a method somewhere like this:
public SomeResults DoSomething(someInput) {
var someResult = [Do your job with someInput];
Log.TrackTheFactYouDidYourJob();
return someResults;
}
DoSomething is very important to your customer: it's a feature, the only thing that matters. That's why you usually write a Cucumber specification asserting it: you wish to verify and communicate the feature is working or not.
Feature: To be able to do something
In order to do something
As someone
I want the system to do this thing
Scenario: A sample one
Given this situation
When I do something
Then what I get is what I was expecting for
No doubt: if the test passes, you can assert you are delivering a working feature. This is what you can call Business Value.
If you want to write a unit test for DoSomething you should pretend (using some mocks) that the rest of the classes and methods are working (that is: that, all dependencies the method is using are correctly working) and assert your method is working.
In practice, you do something like:
public SomeResults DoSomething(someInput) {
var someResult = [Do your job with someInput];
FakeAlwaysWorkingLog.TrackTheFactYouDidYourJob(); // Using a mock Log
return someResults;
}
You can do this with Dependency Injection, or some Factory Method or any Mock Framework or just extending the class under test.
Suppose there's a bug in Log.DoSomething().
Fortunately, the Gherkin spec will find it and your end-to-end tests will fail.
The feature won't work, because Log is broken, not because [Do your job with someInput] is not doing its job. And, by the way, [Do your job with someInput] is the sole responsibility for that method.
Also, suppose Log is used in 100 other features, in 100 other methods of 100 other classes.
Yep, 100 features will fail. But, fortunately, 100 end-to-end tests are failing as well and revealing the problem. And, yes: they are telling the truth.
It's very useful information: I know I have a broken product. It's also very confusing information: it tells me nothing about where the problem is. It communicates me the symptom, not the root cause.
Yet, DoSomething's unit test is green, because it's using a fake Log, built to never break. And, yes: it's clearly lying. It's communicating a broken feature is working. How can it be useful?
(If DoSomething()'s unit test fails, be sure: [Do your job with someInput] has some bugs.)
Suppose this is a system with a broken class:
A single bug will break several features, and several integration tests will fail.
On the other hand, the same bug will break just one unit test.
Now, compare the two scenarios.
The same bug will break just one unit test.
All your features using the broken Log are red
All your unit tests are green, only the unit test for Log is red
Actually, unit tests for all modules using a broken feature are green because, by using mocks, they removed dependencies. In other words, they run in an ideal, completely fictional world. And this is the only way to isolate bugs and seek them. Unit testing means mocking. If you aren't mocking, you aren't unit testing.
The difference
Integration tests tell what's not working. But they are of no use in guessing where the problem could be.
Unit tests are the sole tests that tell you where exactly the bug is. To draw this information, they must run the method in a mocked environment, where all other dependencies are supposed to correctly work.
That's why I think that your sentence "Or is it just a unit test that spans 2 classes" is somehow displaced. A unit test should never span 2 classes.
This reply is basically a summary of what I wrote here: Unit tests lie, that's why I love them.
When I write unit tests I limit the scope of the code being tested to the class I am currently writing by mocking dependencies. If I am writing a Sentence class, and Sentence has a dependency on Word, I will use a mock Word. By mocking Word I can focus only on its interface and test the various behaviors of my Sentence class as it interacts with Word's interface. This way I am only testing the behavior and implementation of Sentence and not at the same time testing the implementation of Word.
Once I've written the unit tests to ensure Sentence behaves correctly when it interacts with Word based on Word's interface, then I write the integration test to make sure that my assumptions about the interactions were correct. For this I supply the actual objects and write a test that exercises a feature that will end up using both Sentence and Word.
My 10 bits :D
I was always told that Unit Tests is the testing of an individual component - which should be exercised to its fullest. Now, this tends to have many levels, since most components are made of smaller parts. For me, a unit is a functional part of the system. So it has to provide something of value (i.e. not a method for string parsing, but a HtmlSanitizer perhaps).
Integration Tests is the next step up, its taking one or more components and making sure they work together as they should.. You are then above the intricacies of worry about how the components work individually, but when you enter html into your HtmlEditControl , it somehow magically knows wether its valid or not..
Its a real movable line though.. I'd rather focus more on getting the damn code to work full stop ^_^
In unit test you test every part isolated:
in integration test you test many modules of your system:
and this what happens when you only use unit tests (generally both windows are working, unfortunately not together):
Sources:
source1
source2
Unit tests use mocks
The thing you're talking about are integration tests that actually test the whole integration of your system. But when you do unit testing you should actually test each unit separately. Everything else should be mocked. So in your case of Sentence class, if it uses Word class, then your Word class should be mocked. This way, you'll only test your Sentence class functionality.
I think when you start thinking about integration tests, you are speaking more of a cross between physical layers rather than logical layers.
For example, if your tests concern itself with generating content, it's a unit test: if your test concerns itself with just writing to disk, it's still a unit test, but once you test for both I/O AND the content of the file, then you have yourself an integration test. When you test the output of a function within a service, it's a unit-test, but once you make a service call and see if the function result is the same, then that's an integration test.
Technically you cannot unit test just-one-class anyway. What if your class is composed with several other classes? Does that automatically make it an integration test? I don't think so.
using Single responsibility design, its black and white. More than 1 responsibility, its an integration test.
By the duck test (looks, quacks, waddles, its a duck), its just a unit test with more than 1 newed object in it.
When you get into mvc and testing it, controller tests are always integration, because the controller contains both a model unit and a view unit. Testing logic in that model, I would call a unit test.
In my opinion the answer is "Why does it matter?"
Is it because unit tests are something you do and integration tests are something you don't? Or vice versa? Of course not, you should try to do both.
Is it because unit tests need to be Fast, Isolated, Repeatable, Self-Validating and Timely and integration tests should not? Of course not, all tests should be these.
It is because you use mocks in unit tests but you don't use them in integration tests? Of course not. This would imply that if I have a useful integration test I am not allowed to add a mock for some part, fear I would have to rename my test to "unit test" or hand it over to another programmer to work on.
Is it because unit tests test one unit and integration tests test a number of units? Of course not. Of what practical importance is that? The theoretical discussion on the scope of tests breaks down in practice anyway because the term "unit" is entirely context dependent. At the class level, a unit might be a method. At an assembly level, a unit might be a class, and at the service level, a unit might be a component.
And even classes use other classes, so which is the unit?
It is of no importance.
Testing is important, F.I.R.S.T is important, splitting hairs about definitions is a waste of time which only confuses newcomers to testing.
The nature of your tests
A unit test of module X is a test that expects (and checks for) problems only in module X.
An integration test of many modules is a test that expects problems that arise from the cooperation between the modules so that these problems would be difficult to find using unit tests alone.
Think of the nature of your tests in the following terms:
Risk reduction: That's what tests are for. Only a combination of unit tests and integration tests can give you full risk reduction, because on the one hand unit tests can inherently not test the proper interaction between modules and on the other hand integration tests can exercise the functionality of a non-trivial module only to a small degree.
Test writing effort: Integration tests can save effort because you may then not need to write stubs/fakes/mocks. But unit tests can save effort, too, when implementing (and maintaining!) those stubs/fakes/mocks happens to be easier than configuring the test setup without them.
Test execution delay: Integration tests involving heavyweight operations (such as access to external systems like DBs or remote servers) tend to be slow(er). This means unit tests can be executed far more frequently, which reduces debugging effort if anything fails, because you have a better idea what you have changed in the meantime. This becomes particularly important if you use test-driven development (TDD).
Debugging effort: If an integration test fails, but none of the unit tests does, this can be very inconvenient, because there is so much code involved that may contain the problem. This is not a big problem if you have previously changed only a few lines -- but as integration tests run slowly, you perhaps did not run them in such short intervals...
Remember that an integration test may still stub/fake/mock away some of its dependencies.
This provides plenty of middle ground between unit tests and system tests (the most comprehensive integration tests, testing all of the system).
Pragmatic approach to using both
So a pragmatic approach would be: Flexibly rely on integration tests as much as you sensibly can and use unit tests where this would be too risky or inconvenient.
This manner of thinking may be more useful than some dogmatic discrimination of unit tests and integration tests.
Unit Testing is a method of testing that verifies the individual units of source code are working properly.
Integration Testing is the phase of software testing in which individual software modules are combined and tested as a group.
Wikipedia defines a unit as the smallest testable part of an application, which in Java/C# is a method. But in your example of Word and Sentence class I would probably just write the tests for sentence since I would likely find it overkill to use a mock word class in order to test the sentence class. So sentence would be my unit and word is an implementation detail of that unit.
I think I would still call a couple of interacting classes a unit test provided that the unit tests for class1 are testing class1's features, and the unit tests for class2 are testing its features, and also that they are not hitting the database.
I call a test an integration test when it runs through most of my stack and even hits the database.
I really like this question, because TDD discussion sometimes feels a bit too purist to me, and it's good for me to see some concrete examples.
I do the same - I call them all unit tests, but at some point I have a "unit test" that covers so much I often rename it to "..IntegrationTest" - just a name change only, nothing else changes.
I think there is a continuation from "atomic tests" (testing one tiny class, or a method) to unit tests (class level) and integration tests - and then functional test (which are normally covering a lot more stuff from the top down) - there doesn't seem to be a clean cut off.
If your test sets up data, and perhaps loads a database/file etc, then perhaps its more of an integration test (integration tests I find use less mocks and more real classes, but that doesn't mean you can't mock out some of the system).
Integration tests: Database persistence is tested.
Unit tests: Database access is mocked. Code methods are tested.
Unit testing is testing against a unit of work or a block of code if you like. Usually performed by a single developer.
Integration testing refers to the test that is performed, preferably on an integration server, when a developer commits their code to a source control repository. Integration testing might be performed by utilities such as Cruise Control.
So you do your unit testing to validate that the unit of work you have built is working and then the integration test validates that whatever you have added to the repository didn't break something else.
Simple Explanation with Analogies
This answer will focus purely on examples.
Integration Tests
Integration tests check if everything is working together.
Unit Tests
They tell you whether one specific thing is working.
Examples
Consider a car:
Integration test for a car: e.g. does the car drive to Pondicherry and back? If so, the car as whole is working. If it fails, you won't really where where: radiator, transmission, engine, or carburettor?
Unit test for a car: Is the engine is working? This tests just the engine; nothing else. If this test fails, then you can be confident that there is a bug in the engine....This ties in closely with the concept of "fakes". You might need some keys in order to start the engine - except, you don't want to go to the hassle of actually an ignition (with a lock)...instead, you would hotwire the car to start it....in other words you would use a "fake" key.
Similarly, in unit testing, you would use "fakes" in order to make the engine work a particular way. And then you could simply test: "is it running".
I call unit tests those tests that white box test a class. Any dependencies that class requires is replaced with fake ones (mocks).
Integration tests are those tests where multiple classes and their interactions are tested at the same time. Only some dependencies in these cases are faked/mocked.
I wouldn't call Controller's integration tests unless one of their dependencies is a real one (i.e. not faked) (e.g. IFormsAuthentication).
Separating the two types of tests is useful for testing the system at different levels. Also, integration tests tend to be long lived, and unit tests are supposed to be quick. The execution speed distinction means they're executed differently. In our dev processes, unit tests are run at check-in (which is fine cos they're super quick), and integration tests are run once/twice per day. I try and run integration tests as often as possible, but usually hitting the database/writing to files/making rpc's/etc slows.
That raises another important point, unit tests should avoid hitting IO (e.g. disk, network, db). Otherwise they slow down alot. It takes a bit of effort to design these IO dependencies out - i can't admit I've been faithful to the "unit tests must be fast" rule, but if you are, the benefits on a much larger system become apparent very quickly.
A little bit academic this question, isn't it? ;-)
My point of view:
For me an integration test is the test of the whole part, not if two parts out of ten are going together.
Our integration test shows, if the master build (containing 40 projects) will succeed.
For the projects we have tons of unit tests.
The most important thing concerning unit tests for me is, that one unit test must not be dependent on another unit test. So for me both test you describe above are unit tests, if they are independent. For integration tests this need not to be important.
Have these tests essentially become integration tests because they now test the integration of these 2 classes? Or is it just a unit test that spans 2 classes?
I think Yes and Yes. Your unit test that spans 2 classes became an integration test.
You could avoid it by testing Sentence class with mock implementation - MockWord class, which is important when those parts of system are large enough to be implemented by different developers. In that case Word is unit tested alone, Sentence is unit tested with help of MockWord, and then Sentence is integration-tested with Word.
Exaple of real difference can be following
1) Array of 1,000,000 elements is easily unit tested and works fine.
2) BubbleSort is easily unit tested on mock array of 10 elements and also works fine
3) Integration testing shows that something is not so fine.
If these parts are developed by single person, most likely problem will be found while unit testing BubbleSoft just because developer already has real array and he does not need mock implementation.
In addition, it's important to remember that both unit tests and integration tests can be automated and written using, for example, JUnit.
In JUnit integration tests, one can use the org.junit.Assume class to test the availability of environment elements (e.g., database connection) or other conditions.
I get asked this a lot in interviews. Until now I'd ramble on pretentiously about my expertise and pontificate about component and acceptance testing.
For years I'd understood only integration and unit tests. I could, but didn't always bother to, write unit tests as a solo developer honing my skills.
Unit tests
That is a crucial difference. Unit tests are easy to implement and execute, requiring, ideally, no dependencies. That is what mocks are for. It is often easier to not mock everything, particularly where you gain coverage of other functions you wrote. Easier, maybe, but that isn't the idea of unit testing.
I'll reiterate, unit tests are meant to be easy to run and small. Their failure provides immediate insight into where a bug has been introduced.
Here is the hierarchy of tests, from cheap and plentiful at the bottom to slow, expensive, and few, at the top:
Several more layers can be conceptualised, but were omitted for clarity.
Integration tests
With integration tests you would consider bringing in serious external dependencies, such as VMs, virtual networks and appliances. Possibly you could use actual modems, routers, and firewalls where the expense was justified.
These wouldn't be run locally but on a build server. A mixture of local Jenkins and cloud based CI providers fulfil this need.
Other test terminology
That is my understanding that has served me for several years in industry. We could talk about component tests, and get a definition, but if the definition isn't in common circulation then it loses value.
Acceptance tests were what we would call business unit or customer requirements. These would lead the direction of everything and sit at the top of the pyramid (picture a dollar sign).
E2E, or end to end testing was used synonymously with integration tests, but I noticed online it is placed above. I guess it could have more relevance to acceptance tests the integration tests, which would tend to be more detailed with less interest from stakeholders (though immense interest internally in the department).
If you're a TDD purist, you write the tests before you write production code. Of course, the tests won't compile, so you first make the tests compile, then make the tests pass.
You can do this with unit tests, but you can't with integration or acceptance tests. If you tried with an integration test, nothing would ever compile until you've finished!