Perl Testing: A Developer's Notebook (Developers Notebook)
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Product Description
Is there any sexier topic in software development than software testing? That is, besides game programming, 3D graphics, audio, high-performance clustering, cool websites, et cetera? Okay, so software testing is low on the list. And that's unfortunate, because good software testing can increase your productivity, improve your designs, raise your quality, ease your maintenance burdens, and help to satisfy your customers, coworkers, and managers.
Perl has a strong history of automated tests. A very early release of Perl 1.0 included a comprehensive test suite, and it's only improved from there. Learning how Perl's test tools work and how to put them together to solve all sorts of previously intractable problems can make you a better programmer in general. Besides, it's easy to use the Perl tools described to handle all sorts of testing problems that you may encounter, even in other languages.
Like all titles in O'Reilly's Developer's Notebook series, this "all lab, no lecture" book skips the boring prose and focuses instead on a series of exercises that speak to you instead of at you.
Perl Testing: A Developer's Notebook will help you dive right in and:
- Write basic Perl tests with ease and interpret the results
- Apply special techniques and modules to improve your tests
- Bundle test suites along with projects
- Test databases and their data
- Test websites and web projects
- Use the "Test Anything Protocol" which tests projects written in languages other than Perl
With today's increased workloads and short development cycles, unit tests are more vital to building robust, high-quality software than ever before. Once mastered, these lessons will help you ensure low-level code correctness, reduce software development cycle time, and ease maintenance burdens.
You don't have to be a die-hard free and open source software developer who lives, breathes, and dreams Perl to use this book. You just have to want to do your job a little bit better.
From the Publisher
Good software testing can increase your productivity, improve your designs, raise your quality, and make you more productive overall. With this series of hands-on labs, you'll learn how Perl's test tools work and how to use them to create basic and complex tests and interpret your results. Perl Testing: A Developer's Notebook is ideal if you want to reduce your software development cycle times.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is a decent overview of Perl testing libraries, that goes further than the material in Intermediate Perl and the second edition of Advanced Perl Programming. It also moves pretty fast, as is the practical bent of the Developer's Notebook series. This will be welcome for any programmer familiar with testing tools in other languages, although testing newbies should be able to understand the mechanics without trouble.
Apart from the unit testing basics, it also goes over mocks, coverage, databases, webpages, testing documentation and module layout, and (most importantly for Perl) testing scripts. The Test::Class module, a xUnit-style module is also covered, although the more procedural Test::More seems to be the standard tool in Perl and is given the most attention. Code for a simple continuous integration tool is presented, which is pretty neat, given how short it is.
The emphasis in this book is very much on the how, rather than the why. Unlike many other books, you are given complete code along with how to execute the scripts and the expected output, which is very helpful. What isn't covered is any of the development methodologies that have driven the interest in testing methods. There's no discussion of Test Driven Development here, or how developer-driven unit testing meshes with the software building process, and there's only cursory or no discussion of what to test, where to start, test organisation (which IMO quickly becomes the limiting step in going test-infected), dealing with legacy code, dummies vs stubs vs mocks, white box vs black box testing etc. For the latter, you will have to consult the likes of xUnit Test Patterns, Unit Testing in Java and Test Driven Development: A Practical Guide. None of these books contain Perl code, however.
This is not a very long book, and there's not always the detail you might want for the more advanced topics. The emphasis on applications rather than principles also means that the book is a little vulnerable to API changes and newer CPAN modules. That said, part of the deal with the Developer's Notebook series is the lack of ceremony, so as long as you know what you're getting it's hard to complain, particularly as it's possible to pick up a copy at a reasonable price. Also, the writing itself is clear, direct and no-nonsense. It's a useful resource, and certainly in a more convenient format than scrolling through countless perldoc pages.
Apart from the unit testing basics, it also goes over mocks, coverage, databases, webpages, testing documentation and module layout, and (most importantly for Perl) testing scripts. The Test::Class module, a xUnit-style module is also covered, although the more procedural Test::More seems to be the standard tool in Perl and is given the most attention. Code for a simple continuous integration tool is presented, which is pretty neat, given how short it is.
The emphasis in this book is very much on the how, rather than the why. Unlike many other books, you are given complete code along with how to execute the scripts and the expected output, which is very helpful. What isn't covered is any of the development methodologies that have driven the interest in testing methods. There's no discussion of Test Driven Development here, or how developer-driven unit testing meshes with the software building process, and there's only cursory or no discussion of what to test, where to start, test organisation (which IMO quickly becomes the limiting step in going test-infected), dealing with legacy code, dummies vs stubs vs mocks, white box vs black box testing etc. For the latter, you will have to consult the likes of xUnit Test Patterns, Unit Testing in Java and Test Driven Development: A Practical Guide. None of these books contain Perl code, however.
This is not a very long book, and there's not always the detail you might want for the more advanced topics. The emphasis on applications rather than principles also means that the book is a little vulnerable to API changes and newer CPAN modules. That said, part of the deal with the Developer's Notebook series is the lack of ceremony, so as long as you know what you're getting it's hard to complain, particularly as it's possible to pick up a copy at a reasonable price. Also, the writing itself is clear, direct and no-nonsense. It's a useful resource, and certainly in a more convenient format than scrolling through countless perldoc pages.
Format:Paperback
Im a big fan of the O'reilly 'Animal Books'. But i must admit that i find the "A Developers Notebook" series a hard read. The writing is sketchy, and can be hard to follow. (Oh and the squared paper and coffee stains is naff.)
I bought this book as i was having trouble getting into testing.
The selection of test modules can be bewildering. Perldoc lacks the depth of explanation to get you started.
Unfortunately this book is sufficiently difficult a read that it went back on the shelf for many months.
Recently, i broke through this impasse, and have now worked my way through the book.
It has good coverage of the topic, and is probably enough to allow me to start testing.
I bought this book as i was having trouble getting into testing.
The selection of test modules can be bewildering. Perldoc lacks the depth of explanation to get you started.
Unfortunately this book is sufficiently difficult a read that it went back on the shelf for many months.
Recently, i broke through this impasse, and have now worked my way through the book.
It has good coverage of the topic, and is probably enough to allow me to start testing.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
21 reviews
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Finally a Practical Guide to Perl Testing
10 Sep 2005
Format:Paperback
You'll read this book cover-to-cover. It's easy,
it's concise, it's fun and it will change your
testing attitude. You'll be inspired immediately,
roll up your sleeves and get started.
Sure, Ian Langworth and chromatic could have
written a 700-page reference tome on all the
different testing modules available and how to use
every single feature. Instead, they just show you
what expert perl programmers do when they're
testing their work.
They're getting you 90% there. If you need more,
it's easy to pick up the details from the manual
pages of the various testing modules, most of
which come with excellent documentation. The
value of this book is that it shows you what's
available and covers an astonishing amount of
different use cases.
O'Reilly's "Developer's Notebook" style is
somewhat unusual, very FAQ-like. The only gripe I
have with this series are recurring headlines like
"How do I do that?" and "What just happened?",
which I'd rather like to be replaced by
pictograms.
Summary: I strongly recommend this book if you
want to improve the quality of your code by
verifying it thoroughly. Using the recipes in
"Perl Testing" takes the unsexyness out of
Quality Assurance.
it's concise, it's fun and it will change your
testing attitude. You'll be inspired immediately,
roll up your sleeves and get started.
Sure, Ian Langworth and chromatic could have
written a 700-page reference tome on all the
different testing modules available and how to use
every single feature. Instead, they just show you
what expert perl programmers do when they're
testing their work.
They're getting you 90% there. If you need more,
it's easy to pick up the details from the manual
pages of the various testing modules, most of
which come with excellent documentation. The
value of this book is that it shows you what's
available and covers an astonishing amount of
different use cases.
O'Reilly's "Developer's Notebook" style is
somewhat unusual, very FAQ-like. The only gripe I
have with this series are recurring headlines like
"How do I do that?" and "What just happened?",
which I'd rather like to be replaced by
pictograms.
Summary: I strongly recommend this book if you
want to improve the quality of your code by
verifying it thoroughly. Using the recipes in
"Perl Testing" takes the unsexyness out of
Quality Assurance.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
no nonsense introduction to the imporant stuff
5 Aug 2007
Format:Paperback
I was initially not excited by O'Reilly's "Developer's Notebook" line of books. A lot of things conspired to make me turn up my nose. The design looked too gimmicky, the first few books turned me off (I don't remember specifics, but it was something like Excel Macros, Java Networking, and some other crap), and something inside me just felt like it was a dumb idea. I don't know why: I used to use similar references all the time, back when the Linux HOWTOs weren't useless. Anyway, when I heard that the new Perl testing book was going to be a notebook, I sort of groaned, but I still made sure I got it as soon as it was out and dug in.
Testing is Really Important. It serves as a secondary form of documentation, it makes it easier to add new features, it makes it easier to fix broken features, and it makes your replacement's job a lot easier when you win the lottery and retire early. It's a sad fact that plenty of people don't test their code, and that many of those who want to just don't know how. PTDN is a crash course for those people. It gets right to the point: page one says, roughly, "You know you should be testing, so here's how you do it. First, run the CPAN shell and install Test::Simple."
The rest of the book sticks to that no-crap attitude. "You want to do X. Here's what you do, and here's what happens when you do it." There isn't much of "why should I do this" or "how does this work on the inside" and that's just right. The book isn't there to show you how Devel::Cover works, or to explain the ideas behind agile development. It's there to help you do the job you know you need to do. It's like an old-style HOWTO extracted back one level of abstraction, or a set of nice fat articles on a series of related topics.
In fact, I think it's safe to say that a more traditional technical book on this subject might have been just the sort of overblown self-important thing that would've kept more people scared of and away from testing. Instead, it's a great crash course for the uninitiated.
For the initiated, I'm not sure how useful it would be. I must say that I didn't find many new or esoteric things in PTDN, but I don't think I'm its target audience. I already use and love coverage reports, I aim for full coverage on my code, and I like keeping my eye on the Test:: namespace for neat new tricks. If I were to hire a lackey, though, who wasn't already familiar with testing, this book would be high up on his must-read list. Knowing how to test your software is vitally important, and this book provides a very short path to that knowledge.
Testing is Really Important. It serves as a secondary form of documentation, it makes it easier to add new features, it makes it easier to fix broken features, and it makes your replacement's job a lot easier when you win the lottery and retire early. It's a sad fact that plenty of people don't test their code, and that many of those who want to just don't know how. PTDN is a crash course for those people. It gets right to the point: page one says, roughly, "You know you should be testing, so here's how you do it. First, run the CPAN shell and install Test::Simple."
The rest of the book sticks to that no-crap attitude. "You want to do X. Here's what you do, and here's what happens when you do it." There isn't much of "why should I do this" or "how does this work on the inside" and that's just right. The book isn't there to show you how Devel::Cover works, or to explain the ideas behind agile development. It's there to help you do the job you know you need to do. It's like an old-style HOWTO extracted back one level of abstraction, or a set of nice fat articles on a series of related topics.
In fact, I think it's safe to say that a more traditional technical book on this subject might have been just the sort of overblown self-important thing that would've kept more people scared of and away from testing. Instead, it's a great crash course for the uninitiated.
For the initiated, I'm not sure how useful it would be. I must say that I didn't find many new or esoteric things in PTDN, but I don't think I'm its target audience. I already use and love coverage reports, I aim for full coverage on my code, and I like keeping my eye on the Test:: namespace for neat new tricks. If I were to hire a lackey, though, who wasn't already familiar with testing, this book would be high up on his must-read list. Knowing how to test your software is vitally important, and this book provides a very short path to that knowledge.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Excellent book
12 Sep 2006
Format:Paperback
Love this book, excellent intro to Perl testing. One of the few (or only) books on Perl testing out there. Not sure what the people who gave it a low rating would've recommended instead - there are some web docs out there but they are all by chromatic too.
Contents include the following:
Test::More, Dest::Deep, test_ok, cmp_deeply, is, Devel::Cover, Test::Harness, Mock modules, program testing, testing databases and Apache, and much more.
Fairly easy to follow. If you program seriously in Perl, but need to learn more about testing, this is the book to have.
Contents include the following:
Test::More, Dest::Deep, test_ok, cmp_deeply, is, Devel::Cover, Test::Harness, Mock modules, program testing, testing databases and Apache, and much more.
Fairly easy to follow. If you program seriously in Perl, but need to learn more about testing, this is the book to have.
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