highkick

HighKick is a no-style, light-weight and powerful testing tool for NodeJS.

Installation

$ npm install highkick

Overview

CoffeeScript:

init = (options, callback) ->
    startWebServer callback
  
testFoo = (callback) ->
    get "http://localhost/api/foo", (error, response) ->
        if error
            callback error
            return
        
        assert.equal response.foo 'foo'
        callback()
        
end = (callback) ->
    stopWebServer callback

module.exports = 
    init: init
    testFoo: testFoo
    end: end

JavaScript:

function init(options, callback){
    startWebServer(callback);
}

function testFoo(callback){
    get('http://localhost/api/foo', function(error, response){
        if(error){
            callback(error);
            return;
        }
        
        assert.equal(response.foo, 'foo')
        
        callback();
    });
}

function end(callback){
    stopWebServer(callback);
}

module.exports = {
    'init': init,
    'testFoo': testFoo,
    'end': end
};

First Steps

HighKick takes a module and executes the functions that have a name starting with "test". A simple test module would look like this;

var assert = require('assert');

exports.testFoo = function(callback){
    try {
        assert.something();
        callback();
    } catch (error) {
        callback(error);
    }
}

exports.testBar = function(callback){
    setTimeout(callback, 100);
}

Below command will run the all tests defined in tests.js;

$ highkick tests.js

To specify the tests that needs to run;

$ KICK=foo highkick tests.js

se comma for separating multiple test names, and '*' for running all tests.

Init

An init function is called before the execution of the tests in a module for once. Init functions take an options object from HighKick and are able to produce the first parameters of test functions as shown in the example below;

function init(options, callback){
    callback( undefined, +(new Date), Math.PI );
}

exports.testFoo = function(timestamp, pi, callback){
    ...
}

beforeEach

Use beforeEach to define a function to be called before each test.

function beforeEach(callback){
    callback( undefined, +(new Date));
}

exports.testFoo = function(now, callback){
    ...
}

Similar to the init functions, what a beforeEach function produces is passed to test functions. The key difference is, beforeEach functions take parameters from init functions, too.

exports.init = function(options, callback){
    callback(undefined, 'hello');
}

exports.beforeEach = function(hello, callback){
    callback(undefined, 'world';
}

exports.testFoo = function(hello, world, callback){
    ...
}

afterEach

An afterEach function is called after each test, regardless of results.

exports.beforeEach = function(callback){
    callback(undefined, new ChildProcess);
}

exports.testFoo = function(process, callback){
    ...
}

exports.afterEach = function(process, callback){
    process.terminate();
    callback();
}

end

Unlikely to afterEach, an end function is called after all tests are done.

exports.init = function(callback){
    callback(undefined, new ChildProcess);
}

exports.testFoo = function(process, callback){
    ...
}

exports.end = function(process, callback){
    process.terminate();
    callback();
}

Nested Tests a.k.a Programmatic Way of Running Tests

HighKick provides a very minimalistic concept of nested tests;

var highkick = require('highkick');

exports.testFoobar = highkick('./foobar');

To see the output of child tests;

$ VERBOSE=foobar highkick tests.js

You can use comma for separating multiple test names and pass '*' for enabling output for child tests.

In the case a custom callback is needed for getting a summary of testsuite:

highkick('./tests', function(error, result){
    if(error){
        logging.error('Ran %d tests, %d failed', result.len, result.fail);
        logging.error(error);
    }

    logging.info('Ran %d tests successfully, without any error.', result.len);
});

Async Running

Pass --async option to run the tests asynchronously;

$ highkick tests.js --async

In the case you need the programmatic way;

var highkick = require('highkick');

highkick({ 'path': './tests', 'async': true }, function(error, result){
    ...
});

Projects Using HighKick

• OneJS
• LowKick
• boxcars
• stonetunnel