From: darren kirby <bulliver@...>
Date: 2007-08-16T06:43:02+09:00
Subject: Unit tests and destructive methods

Hello all,

As my flac library approaches 1000 lines of code I decided it would be prudent 
to finally get around to writing some unit tests, which I have done. Now: I 
have created a 'reference' flac file with known values, which I then read to 
see if my lib parses it correctly.

That works great for the 'read' part of the library, however, I am now adding 
methods which write/rewrite values in the flac file (tags, padding blocks 
etc) making permanent changes in the file, and I am wondering how best to 
write tests for these.

I am thinking that I need to write code which makes a copy of the reference 
file, write the changes, read the copy to ensure the changes were written 
correctly, then delete the copy.

Does this seem reasonable? Is there a better way?

Thanks for consideration,
-d
-- 
darren kirby :: Part of the problem since 1976 :: http://badcomputer.org
"...the number of UNIX installations has grown to 10, with more expected..."
- Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson, June 1972