Unit Testing
Unit tests for Vector2d
Note
There are a lot of unit testing frameworks for C++ programs (for example, Catch2). We are just going to something simple here.
We can use the basic assert statement together with a makefile target to automate testing.
Tip
assert will end the execution at the first failure. We could
instead keep track of the number of failures and explicitly return
that as the return value of main, with 0 signifying all tests
passing.
We’ll do this with our Vector2d class from Example: Mathematical Vectors.
The basic structure we will use is:
int main() {
// create some vectors v1 and v2
// do some operations on v1 and v2
// assert the result
}
Ideally, we’d like to be able to capture the success of our test in a
Bash script, so let’s start by checking what the return value of a
program that failed an assert is
Consider the following:
#include <cassert>
int main() {
assert(false);
}
Let’s build and run that, and then check the return code via:
echo $?
On my machine, I get 134, but the actual code may vary depending
on the compiler and OS. The key however is that it is non-zero. This
means that we can test for a non-zero return in a script.
Comparing vectors
To make life easier, we’d like to be able to check if two vectors are
equal, using ==, and not equal, using !=.
So we want to overload those operators and add them to our class:
bool operator== (const Vector2d& vec) const {
return x == vec.x && y == vec.y;
}
bool operator!= (const Vector2d& vec) const {
return x != vec.x || y != vec.y;
}
The const after the argument list allows these to be used on a
const Vector2d object.
These should be added directly to the class in vector2d.H. The updated
header is:
#ifndef VECTOR_2D_H
#define VECTOR_2D_H
#include <iostream>
class Vector2d {
private:
// our member data
double x;
double y;
public:
// default constructor
Vector2d()
: x{0.0}, y{0.0}
{}
// another constructor
Vector2d(double _x, double _y)
: x{_x}, y{_y}
{}
// setters
inline void set_x(double _x) {x = _x;}
inline void set_y(double _y) {y = _y;}
// operators
// add two vectors
Vector2d operator+ (const Vector2d& vec) {
Vector2d v_out;
v_out.x = x + vec.x;
v_out.y = y + vec.y;
return v_out;
}
// subtract two vectors
Vector2d operator- (const Vector2d& vec) {
Vector2d v_out;
v_out.x = x - vec.x;
v_out.y = y - vec.y;
return v_out;
}
// unary minus
Vector2d operator- () {
Vector2d v_out;
v_out.x = -x;
v_out.y = -y;
return v_out;
}
// comparison
bool operator== (const Vector2d& vec) const {
return x == vec.x && y == vec.y;
}
bool operator!= (const Vector2d& vec) const {
return x != vec.x || y != vec.y;
}
// << is not a class member, but needs access to the member data
friend std::ostream& operator<< (std::ostream& os, const Vector2d& v);
};
std::ostream& operator<< (std::ostream& os, const Vector2d& v)
{
os << "(" << v.x << ", " << v.y << ")";
return os;
}
#endif
Writing tests
Let’s write some basic tests:
#include "vector2d.H"
#include <cassert>
int main() {
auto v1 = Vector2d(2, 4);
auto v2 = Vector2d(-1, 7);
// test addition
std::cout << "testing addition" << std::endl;
assert(v1 + v2 == Vector2d(1, 11));
// test subtraction
std::cout << "testing subtraction" << std::endl;
assert(v1 - v2 == Vector2d(3, -3));
// test unary minus
std::cout << "testing unary minus" << std::endl;
assert(-v1 == Vector2d(-2, -4));
// test not equal
std::cout << "testing inequality" << std::endl;
assert(v1 != v2);
// test the setters and the default constructor
v1.set_x(0.0);
v1.set_y(0.0);
std::cout << "testing setters" << std::endl;
assert(v1 == Vector2d());
std::cout << "all tests passed" << std::endl;
}
These tests cover most of the functionality we explicitly implemented
in vector2d.H. As written, they should all pass.
Automating with make
We’d like to provide a way to automate these tests. Our first method
will be via make that we can run on our own computer.
Let’s start with the general GNUmakefile we developed in our
Makefiles section.
Note
There is a GNU make shell function that looks like it might work, but that actually expands the command and then tries to execute the output.
Here’s what the rule would look like:
testing: unit_test_vector2d
./unit_test_vector2d > /dev/null
@if [ $$? == 0 ]; then echo "tests passed"; fi
After we run our command (we redirect stdout to /dev/null to
make it quiet) we use an if-then statement to check the output.
Note the @ at the start of the line makes it so make doesn’t
print the command itself to the screen, just the output.
Here’s the full version:
# by default, make will try to build the first target it encounters.
# here we make up a dummy name "ALL" (note: this is not a special make
# name, it is just commonly used).
ALL: unit_test_vector2d
# find all of the source files and header files
SOURCES := $(wildcard *.cpp)
HEADERS := $(wildcard *.H)
# create a list of object files by replacing .cpp with .o
OBJECTS := $(SOURCES:.cpp=.o)
# a recipe for making an object file from a .cpp file
# Note: this makes every header file a dependency of every object file,
# which is not ideal, but it is safe.
%.o : %.cpp ${HEADERS}
g++ -c $<
# explicitly write the rule for linking together the executable
unit_test_vector2d: ${OBJECTS}
g++ -o $@ ${OBJECTS}
testing: unit_test_vector2d
./unit_test_vector2d > /dev/null
@if [ $$? -eq 0 ]; then echo "tests passed"; fi
clean:
rm -f *.o unit_test_vector2d
try it…
Let’s make a test fail in our unit_test_vector2d.cpp and make sure that this still works.