Book Image

Crafting Test-Driven Software with Python

By : Alessandro Molina
Book Image

Crafting Test-Driven Software with Python

By: Alessandro Molina

Overview of this book

Test-driven development (TDD) is a set of best practices that helps developers to build more scalable software and is used to increase the robustness of software by using automatic tests. This book shows you how to apply TDD practices effectively in Python projects. You’ll begin by learning about built-in unit tests and Mocks before covering rich frameworks like PyTest and web-based libraries such as WebTest and Robot Framework, discovering how Python allows you to embrace all modern testing practices with ease. Moving on, you’ll find out how to design tests and balance them with new feature development and learn how to create a complete test suite with PyTest. The book helps you adopt a hands-on approach to implementing TDD and associated methodologies that will have you up and running and make you more productive in no time. With the help of step-by-step explanations of essential concepts and practical examples, you’ll explore automatic tests and TDD best practices and get to grips with the methodologies and tools available in Python for creating effective and robust applications. By the end of this Python book, you will be able to write reliable test suites in Python to ensure the long-term resilience of your application using the range of libraries offered by Python for testing and development.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
1
Section 1: Software Testing and Test-Driven Development
6
Section 2: PyTest for Python Testing
13
Section 3: Testing for the Web
16
About Packt

Testing documentation

When documentation is written with the goal of teaching other developers how a system works, providing examples on how to use its inner layers, and train them on the driving design principles behind some complex software, it can be a very effective way to onboard new team members in a project.

In any fairly big and complex project, documentation becomes something that is essential for navigating the complexity of the system without having to rely on our memory to remember how to use every single layer or class involved in the system.

But documentation is also hard. Not only is it actually hard to write, because what might seem obvious and clear to us might sound cryptic to another reader, but also because the code evolves quickly and documentation easily becomes outdated and inaccurate.

Thankfully, testing is a very effective way to also ensure that our documentation doesn't get outdated and that it still applies to our system. As much as we test the application...