Java Reference
In-Depth Information
Software testing principles
A crash is when your competitor's program dies. When your
program dies, it is an “idiosyncrasy.” Frequently, crashes are
followed with a message like “ID 02.” “ID” is an abbreviation
for idiosyncrasy and the number that follows indicates how
many more months of testing the product should have had.
—Guy Kawasaki
This chapter covers
The need for software tests
■
Types of software tests
■
Types of unit tests
■
Earlier chapters in this topic took a pragmatic approach to designing and deploy-
ing unit tests. This chapter steps back and looks at the various types of software tests
and the roles they play in the application's lifecycle.
Why would you need to know all this? Because unit testing isn't something you
do out of the blue. In order to become a well-rounded developer, you need to
understand unit tests compared to functional, integration, and other types of tests.
Once you understand why unit tests are necessary, then you need to know how far
to take your tests. Testing in and of itself isn't the goal.
53
