[Owncloud] Automating what Frank means when he says "Please give it a really good hard test." Help build the test suite!

Fri Sep 21 05:28:29 UTC 2012

Indeed. 
Very cool and thanks a lot :-)

Frank

On 21.09.2012, at 00:50, Thomas Müller <thomas.mueller at tmit.eu> wrote:

> 
> Jörn - thanks a lot for your work - this is the way to go!
> 
> I'm really looking forward to see all your scenarios arriving!
> 
> If anybody has question feel free to ping me on IRC - I'm happy to help!
> 
> Take care,
> 
> Tom aka DeepDiver
> 
> 
> Am Freitag, dem 21.09.2012 um 0:34 schrieb Jörn Friedrich Dreyer:
>> TLDR: Describe a feature with scenarios in gherkin[1]! Do it! Do it now!
>> 
>> Have you, too, asked yourself what Frank actually means when he says
>> "Please give it a really good hard test."? I always imagine a dark
>> cellar, chained to a desk, where I have to sit late into the night to
>> click through every possible action ownCloud offers. What else would a
>> good hard test be?
>> 
>> But I don't want to ruin my evenings like this. I prefer sitting in my
>> garden, sipping a cold beer (you are hereby invited to join me, should
>> you visit Hannover). There must be a better solution! I mean, we are
>> software developers ... we automate things! So, Tom (DeepDiver) and I
>> started working on setting up an automated test suite that emulates a
>> user sitting in front of a browser, doing all the "really good hard
>> test"ing. Now we need to tell it what to do!
>> 
>> As an example I just committed some Gherkin scenarios for the core files
>> app[1]. The nice thing about them is: they are readable by your mom!
>> Take for example, this excerpt:
>> 
>> <gherkin>
>> Feature: files
>>  In order to organize my files
>>  As a mom
>>  I want to have basic file management
>> 
>>  Background
>>    Given I am logged in
>>    # these are the files hosted on demo.owncloud.org
>>    And I am in the files app
>> 
>>  Scenario: create files and folders
>>    When I click on the new button
>>    And I click on the new <type> action
>>    And I enter <filename>
>>    Then I should see <filename>
>>    And <filename> should have mimetype <mimetype>
>>    And <filename> should have size <size>
>> 
>>    Examples:
>>      | type   | mimetype             | filename               | size |
>>      | file   | text/plain           | simplefile.txt         | 0    |
>>      | file   | text/plain           | äöü ß ÄÖÜ € @.txt      | 0    |
>>      | file   | text/x-c             | test.cc                | 0    |
>>      | file   | text/x-php           | test.php               | 0    |
>>      | folder | httpd/unix-directory | Testfolder             | 0    |
>>      | folder | httpd/unix-directory | Testfolder with spaces | 0    |
>> </gherkin>
>> 
>> Not that hard to understand, is it?
>> 
>> Until now, this is basically a checklist, a tester could use to do
>> Franks bidding. Now, as I said earlier, I tend to find this kind of
>> tedious task ... very boring. Enter cucumber[2]: with a little glue
>> code, these gherkin scenarios can be executed as unit tests! The clue
>> code translates "I click on the new button" into code that cucumber uses
>> to execute actions in a browser and check results.
>> 
>> At this point I admit that I sometimes forget to execute the test suite
>> before commiting. Enter our continuous integration server[3] (thx again
>> tom for your awesome work there, too!):
>> Jenkins will monitor the commits and execute the cucumber test suite
>> after each checkin. He currently posts the result of the simpletest test
>> suite into the IRC dev channel allowing you to blame me whenever I break
>> a feature our users expect ;)
>> 
>> In the end, this process will enable us to automate large parts of QA by
>> testing each commit against every feature with combination of sqlite,
>> mysql, Postgresql, Oracle, Firefox and Chrome/Chromium. We will always
>> be able to say "Feature A works, which means that you can do scenario X,
>> Y and Z". I cannot stress enough how awwwesome ... err ... sweeeeeeet
>> this is!
>> 
>> Sure,there is still a ton of work left to do, and as we all know the
>> first steps are always the hardest. Fortunately, even your mom, dad,
>> sister, brother or significant other can help us with the first step -
>> writing textual scenarios for features:
>> 
>>  1. Go to http://demo.owncloud.org
>>  2. Pick an app from the navigation bar
>>  3. Keep the gherkin syntax page open for reference
>> https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Gherkin
>>  4. Learn from feature examples
>> https://github.com/aslakhellesoy/cucumber-rails-test/tree/master/features (all
>> the *.feature files)
>>  5. Start with a general Feature description:
>> 
>>    Feature: [the app name is enough for now]
>>      In order to [goal]
>>      [stakeholder]
>>      wants [behavior]
>> 
>> 6. Flesh out some scenarios with Given-When-Then:
>> https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Given-When-Then
>> 
>>    Scenario: browsing the gallery
>>      Given I am logged in
>>        And I have uploaded the demo files
>>       When I go to the gallery
>>       Then I want to see a thumbnail of <image>
>> 
>>    Examples:
>>      | image                                            |
>>      | Demo Image - ccc.jpg                             |
>>      | Demo Image - Laser Towards Milky Ways Centre.jpg |
>>      | Demo Image - Northern Lights.jpg                 |
>> 	
>> 7. Send the .feature as a response to this message or directly to me.
>> 
>> I'll take care of aggregating the first round of scenarios into
>> features. We'll then create a public repository on github and start
>> writing the glue code (Step Definitions[4]). But thats another topic for
>> the future.
>> 
>> Now, go ahead, write a few feature scenarios, and ask your neighbor to
>> do it, too! It'll save you lots of hours of silly clicking in the night!
>> And it will bring world peace!
>> 
>> so long
>> 
>> Jörn
>> 
>> [1]
>> https://gitorious.org/owncloud-acceptance-test-suite/owncloud-acceptance-test-suite
>> [2] http://cukes.info/
>> [3] http://ci.tmit.eu/
>> [4] https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber/wiki/Step-Definitions
>> 
>> -- 
>> Jörn Friedrich Dreyer (jfd at owncloud.com)
>> Software Developer
>> ownCloud GmbH
>> 
>> Your Data, Your Cloud, Your Way!
>> 
>> ownCloud GmbH, GF: Markus Rex, Holger Dyroff
>> Schloßäckerstrasse 26a, 90443 Nürnberg, HRB 28050 (AG Nürnberg)
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