From: Nathaniel Talbott <nathaniel@...>
Date: 2003-01-28T10:56:02+09:00
Subject: Re: Test::Unit -> order of tests?

Gavin Sinclair [mailto:gsinclair@soyabean.com.au] wrote:

> Just a thought.  JUnit allows specification of test order.  
> Does Test::Unit allow this?  Not a bad idea...

From the TODO:

  * Allow the selection of multiple test orderings.

To address the issue more broadly, my feeling is that Test::Unit should
support certain test orderings without letting anybody use them. Of
course, that's a contradiction, so let me explain...

I hate the fact that test ordering is ever important. I hope that people
only ever use different test orderings in order to identify test
interdependency as a step to removing it. But I recognize that there are
various reasons (a few of them even pragmatic ;-) that will cause
ordering to matter for some tests. My bow to this need at present is to
run the tests in alphabetical order, which makes running tests in a
specific order possible, though it feels hacky. I think I like that it
feels hacky, and will probably leave it feeling hacky no matter what I
do regarding test ordering in the future. While I believe in letting
programmer's shoot themselves in the foot if that's really what they
want to do, I don't feel the need to aim the gun for them ;-)

BTW, I think it was great the number of ideas that were shared in this
thread. The level of testing interest and expertise in the Ruby
community is very, very encouraging. Keep it up!


Nathaniel

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