Saturday, July 26, 2008

Test test test

Matrex is a project that gets tested manually by me before it is released.
For this purpose I use a check list.
I run Matrex and I verify that the operations listed in the check list, like adding a matrix, adding a function... are executed correctly and don't produce side effects.

Matrex is also tested by some of its user, but generally the users test it after a new version has been released. This is not very satisfactory, even if it allows me to release corrective versions.

To reduce the possibility that a version is released with bugs, I started, from version 1.2, to add some unit testing.

In the incoming release 1.3 unit testing will be a main concept:
  • the tested classes are at this moment more than 160, covering almost all Matrex template functions and a good section of the application code.
  • I'm checking the possibility to have also some GUI classes tested, using the SWTBot GUI unit testing tool.
In this way I hope I will be able to:
  • Improve the quality of the code.
  • Help developers understand the code of Matrex.
  • Reduce the possibility of regression bugs.
If you have other ways to improve the reliability of Matrex please let me know.

1 comment:

KetanPadegaonkar said...

I think that's a good way to start to improve stability and quality. Tests are very good way to document code.

Let me know your experience with SWTBot, or if you face any issues.

-- Ketan
http://swtbot.org/