wxperl-users

[wxperl-users] Faking Events for Testing in WxPerl

[Ed H. <ed...@do...>]

We've been talking about trying to put together a "test scripting
language" for our big wxPerl application.

We'd like to be able to write  a file full of commands stated in some
very simplistic code like --


text-enter name "Smith"
button-click update
check name equals "Smith"

that sort of thing -- and have the program trigger the appropriate
series of events, and make sure the right things happen.

I tried to put together a minimalist, "proof of concept" demo.  I put
together in wxglade a tiny application with a couple buttons and other
controls on it.  I made an event handler for the first button which
called the function $frame->fake_event().  fake_event looks like this:


sub fake_event {
   my $self=shift;
   my $entry = "Testing";
   my $event=Wx::CommandEvent->new(wxEVT_COMMAND_BUTTON_CLICKED);
   $event->SetEventObject($self->{button2});
}


I'd only gotten that far -- I hadn't figured out any more than
generating the event and setting its EventObject -- and I ran that
and got this --

C:\src>EventTester.pl

(I clicked on the button to trigger fake_event and...)

Can't locate object method "SetEventObject" via package
"Wx::CommandEvent" at C:
\src\EventTester.pl line 169.

C:\src>


Uh oh.  SetEventObject is a method of Wx::Event, and Wx::CommandEvent is
a subclass of Wx::Event, so that should have been found.

I've got two basic questions --

1. For people who know wxWidgets better than I do -- does this seem like
a profitable direction to go?  Is this a crazy, doomed idea or is it
supposed to be possible to do this sort of thing?

2. Was that error ("Can't locate object method") just missing its perl
wrapper, or was something deeper going wrong?

Thanks, all --

Ed

Re: [wxperl-users] Faking Events for Testing in WxPerl

[Mattia B. <mat...@li...>]

On Fri, 04 Aug 2006 22:41:51 -0400
Ed Heil <ed...@do...> wrote:

  Hi,

> We've been talking about trying to put together a "test scripting
> language" for our big wxPerl application.
> 
> We'd like to be able to write  a file full of commands stated in some
> very simplistic code like --
> 
> 
> text-enter name "Smith"
> button-click update
> check name equals "Smith"
> 
> that sort of thing -- and have the program trigger the appropriate
> series of events, and make sure the right things happen.
> 
> I tried to put together a minimalist, "proof of concept" demo.  I put
> together in wxglade a tiny application with a couple buttons and other
> controls on it.  I made an event handler for the first button which
> called the function $frame->fake_event().  fake_event looks like this:
> 
> 
> sub fake_event {
>    my $self=shift;
>    my $entry = "Testing";
>    my $event=Wx::CommandEvent->new(wxEVT_COMMAND_BUTTON_CLICKED);
>    $event->SetEventObject($self->{button2});
> }
> 

  $window->GetEventHandler()->ProcessEvent( $event );

> I'd only gotten that far -- I hadn't figured out any more than
> generating the event and setting its EventObject -- and I ran that
> and got this --
> 
> C:\src>EventTester.pl
> 
> (I clicked on the button to trigger fake_event and...)
> 
> Can't locate object method "SetEventObject" via package
> "Wx::CommandEvent" at C:
> \src\EventTester.pl line 169.
> 
> C:\src>
> 
> 
> Uh oh.  SetEventObject is a method of Wx::Event, and Wx::CommandEvent is
> a subclass of Wx::Event, so that should have been found.
> 
> I've got two basic questions --
> 
> 1. For people who know wxWidgets better than I do -- does this seem like
> a profitable direction to go?  Is this a crazy, doomed idea or is it
> supposed to be possible to do this sort of thing?

  I think this will work for many common cases, so it is a reasonable
way to go; it does not cover 100% of the cases though. And while faking
(say) button events is trivial, wxTreeCtrl events might be more difficult
to fake.

  http://www.wefi.net/swWxGuiTesting/ uses the same approach. I wanted
to experiment with it (it even has an event recorder) but I could not
get it to compile. It would be probably be easier and cleaner to rewrite
it in Perl (because Perl is much more dynamic than C++, which I think
will help in this case).
 
> 2. Was that error ("Can't locate object method") just missing its perl
> wrapper, or was something deeper going wrong?

  Just missing a perl wrapper.

void
wxEvent::SetEventObject( object )
    wxObject* object

in Event.xs should suffice. Let me know if it works.

HTH
Mattia