The contents of this document are a work in progress

Testing Plexus Components

If you are using Plexus you are going to use and most likely write your own components. In the second case you will need to be able to test them. Plexus container uses quite a rare approach for testing components: components are tested inside the container.

Like a fish needs water, a component by its [definition] needs a container. Fish should be only lifted from the water - its natural environment - for a short time, as fish needs water to breathe and water supports the weight of the fish. Keep the fish in water; keep the component in its natural environment - the container. As there are fishes, which are hard to catch, there are components, which are hard to test outside the container. And as there are some fishes, which can be never caught, there are some components, which practically cannot be tested outside the container.

Important remark: *component testing* is not exactly the same thing as *class testing*. In case of Plexus a component in the simplest possible case is a java class plus the component descriptor. Traditional unit testing allows you to test java classes, but you should be able to test if component as a whole is error free and ready to be used. It means that component's metadata must also be validated - you want to be sure that component definition was written properly, component's requirements were stated properly, correct component profile was chosen etc.

Another thing, which is so appealing about this approach is the fact that testing environment and production environment are exactly the same - this eliminates some surprises which otherwise would appear only when component was deployed.

Last but not least -although it might be counter-intuitive such approach is really making testing easier! Plexus and other lightweight containers have proven to *be a perfect mock infrastructure*: the container is used for "plumbing" components with its depended components. That is why a container is a perfect tool for injecting Mock implementation during test time and real implementation at the runtime.

Note that Plexus is quite "lightweight" and it usually can be embedded a couple of times per second.

Example

Component Interface

package org.codehaus.plexus.tutorial.lesson2;

public interface HelloWorld
{
    String ROLE =  HelloWorld.class.getName();

    String getGreeting();
}

Component Implementation:

package org.codehaus.plexus.tutorial.lesson2;

public class DefaultHelloWorld  implements HelloWorld
{
    public String getGreeting()
    {
        return "Hello World!";
    }
}

Component Test Case:

package org.codehaus.plexus.tutorial.lesson2;

import org.codehaus.plexus.PlexusTestCase;

public class DefaultHelloWorldTest
    extends PlexusTestCase
{
    public void testHelloWorld()
        throws exception
    {
        HelloWorld helloWorld = ( HelloWorld ) lookup( HelloWorld.ROLE );

        assertEquals( "Hello World!", helloWorld.getGreeting() );
    }
}

Normal [component discovery] is performed during the initialization of the test case. It means that if your component descriptor was alraedy added to /META-INF/plexus/components.xml file it will be visible during tests.

In case when you want to override the deafults the only thing you have to do is to create new xml file having the name which matches the class name but with extentinon ".xml". This file must be placed in the same package as the class and be visible in the unit test's classpath.

In case of DefaultHelloWorldTest the file should be names DefaultHelloWorldTest.xml

<plexus>
  <components>
    <component>
      <role>org.codehaus.plexus.tutorial.lesson2.HelloWorld</role>
      <implementation>org.codehaus.plexus.tutorial.lesson2.DefaultHelloWorld</implementation>
    </component>
  </components>
</plexus>

Container Driven Testing

Now we will show an example how container can help in component testing and how it can be used for providing "mock components" during tests.

As exmplained above plexus provides a possiblity of perform lightning-fast component tests. which directly which takes place inside container. As Plexus suports IoC paradigm and it's Dependecy Injection in particular the container is a perfect envinroment for providing mock implementation of component's requirements.

Implementation:

src\main\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\CheeseConnoisseur.java
                                                                 \Cheese.java
                                                                 \DefaultCheeseFinder.java
                                                                 \CheeseFinder.java
                                                                 \CheeseEater.java
src\main\resources\META-INF\plexus\components.xml

Tests:

$root\src\main\test\org\codehaus\plexus\example\
                                                                   MockCheeseFinder.java
                                                                   CheeseConnoisseurTest.java
                                                                   CheeseConnoisseurTest.xml

Now file by file we will explain what is inside of each of files:

$root\src\main\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\Cheese.java

package org.codehaus.plexus.example;

public class Cheese
{
    String name;

    int price;

    public Cheese( String name, int price )
    {
        this.name = name;

        this.price = price;
    }

    public String getName()
    {
        return name;
    }

    public void setName( String name )
    {
        this.name = name;
    }

    public int getPrice()
    {
        return price;
    }

    public void setPrice( int price )
    {
        this.price = price;
    }
}

$root\src\main\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\CheeseEater.java

package org.codehaus.plexus.example;


public interface CheeseEater
{
    String ROLE = CheeseEater.class.getName();

    Cheese chooseCheese();

}

$root\src\main\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\CheeseFinder.java

package org.codehaus.plexus.example;

import java.util.List;

public interface CheeseFinder
{
    String ROLE = CheeseFinder.class.getName();

    List getAllCheeses();
}

$root\src\main\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\DefaultCheeseFinder.java

package org.codehaus.plexus.example;

import java.util.List;

public class DefaultCheeseFinder implements CheeseFinder
{

    public List getAllCheeses()
    {
        List retValue = null;

        //...

        return retValue;

    }
}

$root\src\main\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\CheeseConnoisseur.java

package org.codehaus.plexus.example;

import java.util.Iterator;
import java.util.List;


public class CheeseConnoisseur  implements CheeseEater
{
    /**
     * @component.requirement
     */
    private CheeseFinder cheeseFinder;

    public Cheese chooseCheese()
    {
        Cheese retValue = null;

        int maxPrice = 0;

        List cheeses = cheeseFinder.getAllCheeses();

        for ( Iterator iterator = cheeses.iterator(); iterator.hasNext(); )
        {
            Cheese cheese = ( Cheese ) iterator.next();

            int currentPrice = cheese.getPrice();

            if (  currentPrice > maxPrice )
            {
                retValue = cheese;

                maxPrice = currentPrice;
            }
        }

        return retValue;
    }
}

$root\src\main\resources\META-INF\plexus\components.xml

<component-set>
    <components>
        <component>
            <role>org.codehaus.plexus.example.CheeseEater</role>
            <implementation>org.codehaus.plexus.example.CheeseConnoisseur</implementation>
            <requirements>
                <requirement>
                    <role>org.codehaus.plexus.example.CheeseFinder</role>
                </requirement>
            </requirements>
        </component>
    </components>
</component-set>

Test Code:

$root\src\test\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\CheeseConnoisseurTest.java

package org.codehaus.plexus.example;

import org.codehaus.plexus.PlexusTestCase;

public class CheeseConnoisseurTest extends PlexusTestCase
{

    private CheeseEater connoisseur;


    protected void setUp() throws Exception
    {
        super.setUp();

        connoisseur = ( CheeseEater ) lookup( CheeseEater.ROLE );
    }

    public void testConnoisseur()
    {
       Cheese cheese = connoisseur.chooseCheese();

       assertEquals( "Gruyere", cheese.getName() );
    }
}

$root\src\test\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\MockCheeseFinder.java

package org.codehaus.plexus.example;

import java.util.List;
import java.util.LinkedList;

public class MockCheeseFinder implements CheeseFinder
{
    public List getAllCheeses()
    {
        List retValue = new LinkedList();

        addCheese( retValue, "Gruyere", 120 );

        addCheese( retValue, "Appenzell", 100 );

        addCheese( retValue, "Vacherin-Fribourgeois", 80 );

        return retValue;
    }

    private void addCheese( List cheeses, String name, int price )
    {
        Cheese chesee = new Cheese( name, price );

        cheeses.add( chesee );

    }
}

$root\src\test\java\org\codehaus\plexus\example\CheeseConnoisseurTest.xml

<plexus>
    <components>
        <!-- We will use mock component for testing-->
        <component>
            <role>org.codehaus.plexus.example.CheeseFinder</role>
            <implementation>org.codehaus.plexus.example.MockCheeseFinder</implementation>
        </component>
    </components>
</plexus>