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130 lines
5.2 KiB
130 lines
5.2 KiB
11 months ago
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<title>Julio Biason .Me 4.3</title>
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<div class="sidebar-about">
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<a href="https://blog.juliobiason.me"><h1>Julio Biason .Me 4.3</h1></a>
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<p class="lead">Old school dev living in a 2.0 dev world</p>
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<li class="sidebar-nav-item"><a href="/pt">Português</a></li>
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<li class="sidebar-nav-item"><a href="/pt/tags">Tags (PT)</a></li>
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<div class="content container">
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<div class="post">
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<h1 class="post-title">Things I Learnt The Hard Way - Tests Make Better APIs</h1>
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<span class="post-date">
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2019-06-19
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<a href="https://blog.juliobiason.me/tags/book/">#book</a>
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<a href="https://blog.juliobiason.me/tags/things-i-learnt/">#things i learnt</a>
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<a href="https://blog.juliobiason.me/tags/unit-tests/">#unit tests</a>
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<a href="https://blog.juliobiason.me/tags/layers/">#layers</a>
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<a href="https://blog.juliobiason.me/tags/apis/">#apis</a>
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</span>
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<p>Testing things in isolation may give a better view of your APIs.</p>
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<span id="continue-reading"></span>
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<p>After reading the <a href="/books/things-i-learnt/integration-tests">integration tests</a>
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chapter, you may end up with the impression that I don't like unit tests<sup class="footnote-reference"><a href="#1">1</a></sup>.</p>
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<p>Actually, I think they provide some good intrinsic values.</p>
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<p>For example, as mentioned before, they can provide a better look at the
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adherence to the design.</p>
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<p>But, at the same time, they give a better view of your internal -- and even
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external -- APIs.</p>
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<p>For example, you're writing the tests for the view layer -- 'cause, you know,
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we write everything in layers; layers on top of layers<sup class="footnote-reference"><a href="#2">2</a></sup> -- and you're noticing
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that you have to keep a lot of data (state) around to be able to make the
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calls to the controller. Or that you have similar calls, but the parameters
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are sometimes switched (say, one function gets a token and a user ID, and
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another function gets a user ID and a token -- why?) That's a sign that you
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may have to take a better look at the controller API.</p>
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<p>Not only that, but take, for example, the fact that you're working on a
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library -- which will be called by someone else -- and you're writing tests
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for the most external layer, the layer that will be exposed by that library.
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And, again, you're noticing that you have to keep a lot of context around,
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lots of variables, variables coming from different places and similar calls
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using parameters in different ways. Your tests will look like a mess, don't
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they? That's because the API <em>is</em> a mess.</p>
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<p>Unit testing your layers makes you the <em>user</em> of that layer API, and then you
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can see how much one would suffer -- or, hopefully, enjoy -- using that.</p>
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<div class="footnote-definition" id="1"><sup class="footnote-definition-label">1</sup>
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<p>Again, let's ignore for a second that there are no "unit" in "unit
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tests"...
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<sup class="footnote-reference"><a href="#2">2</a></sup>: And layers all the way down, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtles_all_the_way_down">like
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turtles</a>.</p>
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</div>
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<div>
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<div style="float:left">
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<< <a href="/books/things-i-learnt/integration-tests">Unit Tests Are Good, Integration Tests Are Gooder</a>
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</div>
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<div style="float:right">
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<a href="/books/things-i-learnt/tests-in-the-command-line">Make Tests That You Know How To Run on the Command line</a> >>
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</div>
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</div>
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