Test suites are a collection of testing methods or specifications (specs) inside of a testing bundle CFC. Let's investigate the styles.

A test suite begins with a call to our TestBox describe() function with at least two arguments: a title and a body closure within the life-cycle method called run(). The title is the name of the suite to register and the body function is the block of code that implements the suite. There are more arguments which you can see below:

function run( testResults, testBox ){

     describe("A suite", function(){
          it("contains spec with an awesome expectation", function(){
               expect( true ).toBeTrue();
          });
     });

}

In BDD, suites can be nested within each other which provides a great capability of building trees of tests. Not only does it arrange them in tree format but also TestBox will execute the life-cycle methods in order of nested suites as it traverses the tree.

describe("A spec", function() {

     beforeEach(function() {
          coldbox = 22;
          application.wirebox = new coldbox.system.ioc.Injector();
     });

     afterEach(function() {
          coldbox = 0;
          structDelete( application, "wirebox" );
     });

     it("is just a function, so it can contain any code", function() {
          expect( coldbox ).toBe( 22 );
     });

     it("can have more than one expectation and talk to scopes", function() {
          expect( coldbox ).toBe( 22 );
          expect( application.wirebox.getInstance( 'MyService' ) ).toBeComponent();
     });

     describe("nested inside a second describe", function() {

          beforeEach(function() {
               awesome = 22;
          });

          afterEach(function() {
               awesome = 22 + 8;
          });

          it("can reference both scopes as needed ", function() {
            expect( coldbox ).toBe( awesome );
          });
     });

     it("can be declared after nested suites and have access to nested variables", function() {
          expect( awesome ).toBe( 30 );
     });

});

BDD Specs

Specs are defined by calling the TestBox it() global function, which takes in a title and a function. The title is the title of this spec or test you will write and the function is a block of code that represents the test/spec. A spec will contain most likely one or more expectations that will test the state of the SUT (software under test) or sometimes referred to as code under test.

An expectation is a nice assertion DSL that TestBox exposes so you can pretty much read what should happen in the testing scenario. A spec will pass if all expectations pass. A spec with one or more expectations that fail will fail the entire spec.

function run( testResults, testBox ){

     describe("A suite", function(){
          it("contains spec with an awesome expectation", function(){
               expect( true ).toBeTrue();
          });

          it("contains a spec with more than 1 expectation", function(){
               expect( [1,2,3] ).toBeArray();
               expect( [1,2,3] ).toHaveLength( 3 );
          });
     });

}

The testing bundle CFC is actually the suite in xUnit style as it contains all the test methods you would like to test with. Usually, this CFC represents a test case for a specific software under test (SUT), whether that's a model object, service, etc. This component can have some cool annotations as well that can alter its behavior.

component displayName="The name of my suite" asyncAll="boolean" labels="list" skip="boolean"{

}

Bundle Annotations

Caution If you activate the asyncAll flag for asynchronous testing, you HAVE to make sure your tests are also thread safe and appropriately locked.

Tests

TestBox discovers test methods in your bundle CFC by applying the following discovery rules:

• Any method that has a test annotation on it

• Any public method that starts or ends with the word test

// Via inline annotation
function shouldBeAwesome() test{}

/**
* Via comment annotation
* @test
*/
function shouldBeAwesome(){}

// via conventions
function testShouldDoThis(){}
function shouldDoThisTest(){}

Each test method will test the state of the SUT (software under test) or sometimes referred to as code under test. It will do so by asserting that actual values from an execution match an expected value or condition. TestBox offers an assertion library that you have available in your bundle via the injected variable $assert. You can also use our expectations library if you so desire, but that is mostly used in our BDD approach (chapter 3: Primers).

function testIncludes(){
       $assert.includes( "hello", "HE" );
       $assert.includes( [ "Monday", "Tuesday" ] , "monday" );
}

Each test function can also have some cool annotations attached to it.