Re: [Asunit-users] Testing view classes (subclasses of MovieClip and the likes)

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Hi Luke,

Does that help?
>

A lot!

Thank you very much for taking your time to help me.

Marcelo.

On 12/29/06, Luke Bayes <lb...@gm...> wrote:
>
> Hey Marcelo,
>
> We definitely don't ship test code in our production swf files, but we do
> make sure that everything our production code has access to, is available in
> our test harness. Regardless of how you physically segment test classes from
> production code, the compiler will only include classes that are referenced
> one way or another from the main class (MTASC), the main timeline, or
> exported symbols (FLA). test cases point at production code, but production
> code never references test cases. We have seen projects built with the test
> classes alongside the production classes, test packages inside production
> packages and like you, have settled on the mirrored test package approach.
> Basically, it doesn't matter where the test classes are as long as nothing
> from your production compilation references them.
>
> In environments where we have to use a fla file, we use authoring to
> compile it once, then tell MTASC to use the resulting swf file as 'input'.
> When you do this, mtasc has access to all those visual assets by their
> linkage ids - forms and animations and whatnot. I also (quite handily)
> clobbers all ActionScript classes and replaces them with bytecode from it's
> compilation. This is a rather simple compiler flag available in MTASC.
>
> This process tends to work pretty well since we generally modify the code
> much more frequently than the visual asset fla. I wouldn't recommend
> creating multiple, separate fla files for each different form as this can
> make sharing assets and clean compilation much more complicated.
>
> When you say, "I don't insert any code on the fla file at all. Everything
> is coded on external AS2 classes", of course we don't write any ActionScript
> in the authoring tool, but we do associate ActionScript 2 classes with
> symbols in the fla library using the symbol properties dialog. This
> generally seems to work fine - even when post-compiling using MTASC. But the
> point is that we wind up with a fla/swf file that is compiled with MMC
> (Authoring) - then use MTASC to build the deployed and test harness SWF
> files. If we were going to try building something modular that could load
> separate content swfs as needed, I suspect we would use a similar process,
> using MTASC exclude directives to make the subsequent modular swfs...
>
> As far as MovieClip instantiation that relies on symbols that aren't
> available in the test harness, I would argue that a test swf that doesn't
> include everything that exists in the production swf is not thoroughly
> testing your production functionality.
>
> Does that help?
>
>
> Thanks,
>
>
> Luke Bayes
> www.asunit.org
>
>
>
> On 12/29/06, Marcelo de Moraes Serpa wrote:
> >
> > This line is usually switched from running our application main function
> > > to running our test suite main function
> >
> >
> > I couldn't really understand, Luke. The way I'm doing right now is
> > having a test swf and that is all. The way you put it, seems like you mix
> > test code with production code, is that right?
> >
> > Let me explain better how I've set up my unit testing workflow:
> >
> > I'm using AS2ANT unittest task. So, I compile the TestRunner into a swf
> > file and run it before proceeding with the rest of the build. I have two
> > identical project trees - one for the production source files and one for
> > theses classes' test classes, like this:
> >
> > * com.cconline.views.IndexView
> > * tests.com.cconline.views.IndexViewTest
> >
> > All the main test classes (TestSuite and TestRunner) are on the test.*
> > namespace.
> >
> > My project consists of various .fla files, one for each of the
> > application's views (forms). I find fla's easier for making complex
> > design-oriented layouts and sometimes animations. I don't insert any code on
> > the fla file at all. Everything is coded on external AS2 classes.
> >
> > It wasn't also clear on how should I handle MovieClip instantiation on
> > the test swf when this MovieClip relies on assets that are not present on
> > the test swf's library.
> >
> > Thanks a lot for the help!
> >
> > Marcelo.
> >
> > On 12/29/06, Luke Bayes < lb...@gm...> wrote:
> > >
> > > Hey Marcelo,
> > >
> > > There are a couple of issues you're talking about here, I'm going to
> > > restate them a little differently, please let me know if this is inaccurate.
> > >
> > > 1) Should I ever write a unit test for a visual entity?
> > > Yes. There are definitely times when views have code. Even using MVC,
> > > the view is responsible for some work and unit testing can verify that this
> > > work is being done as expected.
> > >
> > > 2) How do I structure an application for unit testing?
> > > Ali and I spent a considerable amount of time thinking about this
> > > problem, and after quite a bit of trial and error, we realized that one of
> > > the most important aspects to testing is that the environment your test
> > > harness operates in should be as nearly identical to your production
> > > environment as possible. This includes library assets, frameworks, etc...
> > > For example, Macromedia's components manipulate some core object prototypes,
> > > add functions to _global and place assets on _root in a very high level
> > > which affects our ability to use _root.getNextHighestDepth(). IF we are
> > > using components in our application, but fail to load that library into our
> > > test swf, we will see behaviors in production that are very different from
> > > those that we find in our tests.
> > >
> > > We generally try to avoid using a fla file if at all possible, but if
> > > we are forced to use a .fla file for a project, the most important thing
> > > that we do, is avoid doing any real work on the main timeline. If we have
> > > some animation or some frame-based work that needs done, we put it into a
> > > MovieClip. The main timeline of our .fla files generally has one line of
> > > ActionScript. This line is usually switched from running our application
> > > main function to running our test suite main function. This has the added
> > > benefit of allowing us to point MTASC at either of these main functions and
> > > simply swallow the MMC-compiled swf file.
> > >
> > > // SomeApplication.main();
> > > SomeApplicationRunner.main();
> > >
> > > I hope that helps.
> > >
> > >
> > > Luke Bayes
> > > www.asunit.org
> > >
> > >
> > > On 12/29/06, Marcelo de Moraes Serpa wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Hi Luke, thanks for the reply :)
> > > >
> > > > It is still not clear to me the role of MovieClip classes on asunit
> > > > unit tests. From what I've been reading about Unit Testing so far, I can
> > > > understand that visual entities should not be unit tested directly. Instead,
> > > > the business classes that are used by it should be tested and I don't think
> > > > business classes should inherit MovieClip (am I misunderstanding something
> > > > here?).
> > > >
> > > > But let's say I really want to instantiate a MovieClip class on my
> > > > unit test. The XUL UI feature you described is for creating mock objects for
> > > > MovieClip classes, right? I'm asking this becouse it would be too much of a
> > > > stress to try to instantiate a regular "non-serializable" MovieClip class as
> > > > it depends on assets that are not present on the test swf library (and
> > > > should not be present, I'm almost sure!).
> > > >
> > > > Cheers,
> > > >
> > > > Marcelo.
> > > >
> > > >
> > >
> > >
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