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Test infect your Enterprise JavaBeans

Learn how to test your J2EE components live and in the wild

By Michael T. Nygard and Tracie Karsjens, JavaWorld.com, 05/26/00

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We can never overtest software, but we seldom test it enough. When testing does begin, system or integration testing is the norm, with formal testing and quality assurance efforts typically starting at the last minute -- when the software is nearing release. Inevitably, pressure builds on testers to rush through the testing process. Needless to say, this does not encourage thoroughness. At the same time, the development team is urged to fix defects as quickly as possible. This, too, does not promote careful attention to detail. When this process does produce high-quality software -- a rare occurrence -- it is the result of superhuman efforts by conscientious individuals.

Since a J2EE application is assembled from components, integration testing comes too late in the process. Individual components often behave differently when they are by themselves than when assembled with other components. To eliminate unexpected interactions, J2EE components must be unit tested before they are gathered into an application. This article discusses unit testing techniques and how to apply unit testing to J2EE components, particularly Enterprise JavaBeans (EJBs).

Note: The complete source code for this article, including JUnit 3.2 sources, the servlet interface, build scripts, the deployment descriptor, and the sample tests can be downloaded as a zip file in Resources.

Unit testing

If you are already test infected, skip to the next section. If not, you need to know about the benefits of real unit testing.

Unit testing is a critical, but often misunderstood, part of the software development process. Unit testing involves individually testing each small unit of code to ensure that it works on its own, independent of the other units. In object-oriented languages, a unit is often, but not always, equivalent to a class.

If developers knew for certain that each piece of the application works as it was designed to do, they would realize that problems with the assembled application must result from the way the components were put together. Unit testing tells developers that an application's pieces are working as designed.

For example, if you were building a car, you would probably construct each of its many complex components separately. Unless you tested each piece individually before assembly, you would have a lot of trouble figuring out why the car doesn't run correctly after it is put it together. For example, was the transmission built improperly, or did you hook it up incorrectly? Without having evaluated each piece beforehand, you have no way of knowing whether one or more of the pieces was built incorrectly, whether your integration was faulty, or both. Imagine the amount of time you would waste trying to analyze what was wrong with the car. And how much confidence would you have in its long-term reliability? If you had tested each component by itself before assembly, you would be able to focus your debugging efforts on the integration -- the way you assembled the car. And since you would have confidence in the individual pieces of the car, you would have more confidence in the car as a whole.

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