<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!-- $Id: reporter_documentation.xml 1771 2008-04-20 16:11:30Z pp11 $ -->
<page title="Test reporter documentation" here="Reporting">
    <long_title>SimpleTest for PHP test runner and display documentation</long_title>
    <content>
        <introduction>
            <p>
                SimpleTest pretty much follows the MVC pattern
                (Model-View-Controller).
                The reporter classes are the view and the model is your
                test cases and their hiearchy.
                The controller is mostly hidden from the user of
                SimpleTest unless you want to change how the test cases
                are actually run, in which case it is possible to
                override the runner objects from within the test case.
                As usual with MVC, the controller is mostly undefined
                and there are other places to control the test run.
            </p>
        </introduction>
        <section name="html" title="Reporting results in HTML">
            <p>
                The default test display is minimal in the extreme.
                It reports success and failure with the conventional red and
                green bars and shows a breadcrumb trail of test groups
                for every failed assertion.
                Here&apos;s a fail...
                <div class="demo">
                    <h1>File test</h1>
                    <span class="fail">Fail</span>: createnewfile->True assertion failed.<br />
                    <div style="padding: 8px; margin-top: 1em; background-color: red; color: white;">1/1 test cases complete.
                    <strong>0</strong> passes, <strong>1</strong> fails and <strong>0</strong> exceptions.</div>
                </div>
                And here all tests passed...
                <div class="demo">
                    <h1>File test</h1>
                    <div style="padding: 8px; margin-top: 1em; background-color: green; color: white;">1/1 test cases complete.
                    <strong>1</strong> passes, <strong>0</strong> fails and <strong>0</strong> exceptions.</div>
                </div>
                The good news is that there are several points in the display
                hiearchy for subclassing.
            </p>
            <p>
                For web page based displays there is the
                <code>HtmlReporter</code> class with the following
                signature...
<php><![CDATA[
class HtmlReporter extends SimpleReporter {
    public HtmlReporter($encoding) { ... }
    public makeDry(boolean $is_dry) { ... }
    public void paintHeader(string $test_name) { ... }
    public void sendNoCacheHeaders() { ... }
    public void paintFooter(string $test_name) { ... }
    public void paintGroupStart(string $test_name, integer $size) { ... }
    public void paintGroupEnd(string $test_name) { ... }
    public void paintCaseStart(string $test_name) { ... }
    public void paintCaseEnd(string $test_name) { ... }
    public void paintMethodStart(string $test_name) { ... }
    public void paintMethodEnd(string $test_name) { ... }
    public void paintFail(string $message) { ... }
    public void paintPass(string $message) { ... }
    public void paintError(string $message) { ... }
    public void paintException(string $message) { ... }
    public void paintMessage(string $message) { ... }
    public void paintFormattedMessage(string $message) { ... }
    protected string getCss() { ... }
    public array getTestList() { ... }
    public integer getPassCount() { ... }
    public integer getFailCount() { ... }
    public integer getExceptionCount() { ... }
    public integer getTestCaseCount() { ... }
    public integer getTestCaseProgress() { ... }
}
]]></php>
                Here is what some of these methods mean. First the display methods
                that you will probably want to override...
                <ul class="api">
                    <li>
                        <code>HtmlReporter(string $encoding)</code><br />
                        is the constructor.
                        Note that the unit test sets up the link to the display
                        rather than the other way around.
                        The display is a mostly passive receiver of test events.
                        This allows easy adaption of the display for other test
                        systems beside unit tests, such as monitoring servers.
                        The encoding is the character encoding you wish to
                        display the test output in.
                        In order to correctly render debug output when
                        using the web tester, this should match the encoding
                        of the site you are trying to test.
                        The available character set strings are described in
                        the PHP <a href="http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.htmlentities.php">html_entities()</a>
                        function.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>void paintHeader(string $test_name)</code><br />
                        is called once at the very start of the test when the first
                        start event arrives.
                        The first start event is usually delivered by the top level group
                        test and so this is where <code>$test_name</code>
                        comes from.
                        It paints the page titles, CSS, body tag, etc.
                        It returns nothing (<code>void</code>).
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>void paintFooter(string $test_name)</code><br />
                        Called at the very end of the test to close any tags opened
                        by the page header.
                        By default it also displays the red/green bar and the final
                        count of results.
                        Actually the end of the test happens when a test end event
                        comes in with the same name as the one that started it all
                        at the same level.
                        The tests nest you see.
                        Closing the last test finishes the display.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>void paintMethodStart(string $test_name)</code><br />
                        is called at the start of each test method.
                        The name normally comes from method name.
                        The other test start events behave the same way except
                        that the group test one tells the reporter how large
                        it is in number of held test cases.
                        This is so that the reporter can display a progress bar
                        as the runner churns through the test cases.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>void paintMethodEnd(string $test_name)</code><br />
                        backs out of the test started with the same name.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>void paintFail(string $message)</code><br />
                        paints a failure.
                        By default it just displays the word fail, a breadcrumbs trail
                        showing the current test nesting and the message issued by
                        the assertion.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>void paintPass(string $message)</code><br />
                        by default does nothing.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>string getCss()</code><br />
                        Returns the CSS styles as a string for the page header
                        method.
                        Additional styles have to be appended here if you are
                        not overriding the page header.
                        You will want to use this method in an overriden page header
                        if you want to include the original CSS.
                    </li>
                </ul>
                There are also some accessors to get information on the current
                state of the test suite.
                Use these to enrich the display...
                <ul class="api">
                    <li>
                        <code>array getTestList()</code><br />
                        is the first convenience method for subclasses.
                        Lists the current nesting of the tests as a list
                        of test names.
                        The first, most deeply nested test, is first in the
                        list and the current test method will be last.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>integer getPassCount()</code><br />
                        returns the number of passes chalked up so far.
                        Needed for the display at the end.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>integer getFailCount()</code><br />
                        is likewise the number of fails so far.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>integer getExceptionCount()</code><br />
                        is likewise the number of errors so far.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>integer getTestCaseCount()</code><br />
                        is the total number of test cases in the test run.
                        This includes the grouping tests themselves.
                    </li>
                    <li>
                        <code>integer getTestCaseProgress()</code><br />
                        is the number of test cases completed so far.
                    </li>
                </ul>
                One simple modification is to get the HtmlReporter to display
                the passes as well as the failures and errors...
<php><![CDATA[
<strong>class ShowPasses extends HtmlReporter {
    
    function paintPass($message) {
        parent::paintPass($message);
        print "&<span class=\"pass\">Pass</span>: ";
        $breadcrumb = $this->getTestList();
        array_shift($breadcrumb);
        print implode("-&gt;", $breadcrumb);
        print "-&gt;$message<br />\n";
    }
    
    protected function getCss() {
        return parent::getCss() . ' .pass { color: green; }';
    }
}</strong>
]]></php>
            </p>
            <p>
                One method that was glossed over was the <code>makeDry()</code>
                method.
                If you run this method, with no parameters, on the reporter
                before the test suite is run no actual test methods
                will be called.
                You will still get the events of entering and leaving the
                test methods and test cases, but no passes or failures etc,
                because the test code will not actually be executed.
            </p>
            <p>
                The reason for this is to allow for more sophistcated
                GUI displays that allow the selection of individual test
                cases.
                In order to build a list of possible tests they need a
                report on the test structure for drawing, say a tree view
                of the test suite.
                With a reporter set to dry run that just sends drawing events
                this is easily accomplished.
            </p>
        </section>
        <section name="other" title="Extending the reporter">
            <p>
                Rather than simply modifying the existing display, you might want to
                produce a whole new HTML look, or even generate text or XML.
                Rather than override every method in
                <code>HtmlReporter</code> we can take one
                step up the class hiearchy to <code>SimpleReporter</code>
                in the <em>simple_test.php</em> source file.
            </p>
            <p>
                A do nothing display, a blank canvas for your own creation, would
                be...
<php><![CDATA[
<strong>require_once('simpletest/simple_test.php');</strong>

class MyDisplay extends SimpleReporter {<strong>
    </strong>
    function paintHeader($test_name) {
    }
    
    function paintFooter($test_name) {
    }
    
    function paintStart($test_name, $size) {<strong>
        parent::paintStart($test_name, $size);</strong>
    }
    
    function paintEnd($test_name, $size) {<strong>
        parent::paintEnd($test_name, $size);</strong>
    }
    
    function paintPass($message) {<strong>
        parent::paintPass($message);</strong>
    }
    
    function paintFail($message) {<strong>
        parent::paintFail($message);</strong>
    }
}
]]></php>
                No output would come from this class until you add it.
            </p>
        </section>
        <section name="cli" title="The command line reporter">
            <p>
                SimpleTest also ships with a minimal command line reporter.
                The interface mimics JUnit to some extent, but paints the
                failure messages as they arrive.
                To use the command line reporter simply substitute it
                for the HTML version...
<php><![CDATA[
<?php
require_once('simpletest/unit_tester.php');
require_once('simpletest/reporter.php');

$test = &new TestSuite('File test');
$test->addTestFile('tests/file_test.php');
$test->run(<strong>new TextReporter()</strong>);
?>
]]></php>
                Then invoke the test suite from the command line...
<pre class="shell">
php file_test.php
</pre>
                You will need the command line version of PHP installed
                of course.
                A passing test suite looks like this...
<pre class="shell">
File test
OK
Test cases run: 1/1, Failures: 0, Exceptions: 0
</pre>
                A failure triggers a display like this...
<pre class="shell">
File test
1) True assertion failed.
    in createnewfile
FAILURES!!!
Test cases run: 1/1, Failures: 1, Exceptions: 0
</pre>
            </p>
            <p>
                One of the main reasons for using a command line driven
                test suite is of using the tester as part of some automated
                process.
                To function properly in shell scripts the test script should
                return a non-zero exit code on failure.
                If a test suite fails the value <code>false</code>
                is returned from the <code>SimpleTest::run()</code>
                method.
                We can use that result to exit the script with the desired return
                code...
<php><![CDATA[
<?php
require_once('simpletest/unit_tester.php');
require_once('simpletest/reporter.php');

$test = &new TestSuite('File test');
$test->addTestFile('tests/file_test.php');
<strong>exit ($test->run(new TextReporter()) ? 0 : 1);</strong>
?>
]]></php>
                Of course we don&apos;t really want to create two test scripts,
                a command line one and a web browser one, for each test suite.
                The command line reporter includes a method to sniff out the
                run time environment...
<php><![CDATA[
<?php
require_once('simpletest/unit_tester.php');
require_once('simpletest/reporter.php');

$test = &new TestSuite('File test');
$test->addTestFile('tests/file_test.php');
<strong>if (TextReporter::inCli()) {</strong>
    exit ($test->run(new TextReporter()) ? 0 : 1);
<strong>}</strong>
$test->run(new HtmlReporter());
?>
]]></php>
                This is the form used within SimpleTest itself.
            </p>
        </section>
        <section name="xml" title="Remote testing">
            <p>
                SimpleTest ships with an <code>XmlReporter</code> class
                used for internal communication.
                When run the output looks like...
<pre class="shell"><![CDATA[
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<run>
  <group size="4">
    <name>Remote tests</name>
    <group size="4">
      <name>Visual test with 48 passes, 48 fails and 4 exceptions</name>
      <case>
        <name>testofunittestcaseoutput</name>
        <test>
          <name>testofresults</name>
          <pass>This assertion passed</pass>
          <fail>This assertion failed</fail>
        </test>
        <test>
          ...
        </test>
      </case>
    </group>
  </group>
</run>
]]></pre>
                You can make use of this format with the parser
                supplied as part of SimpleTest itself.
                This is called <code>SimpleTestXmlParser</code> and
                resides in <em>xml.php</em> within the SimpleTest package...
<php><![CDATA[
<?php
require_once('simpletest/xml.php');
    
...
$parser = &new SimpleTestXmlParser(new HtmlReporter());
$parser->parse($test_output);
?>
]]></php>
                The <code>$test_output</code> should be the XML format
                from the XML reporter, and could come from say a command
                line run of a test case.
                The parser sends events to the reporter just like any
                other test run.
                There are some odd occasions where this is actually useful.
            </p>
            <p>
                A problem with large test suites is thet they can exhaust
                the default 8Mb memory limit on a PHP process.
                By having the test groups output in XML and run in
                separate processes, the output can be reparsed to
                aggregate the results into a much smaller footprint top level
                test.
            </p>
            <p>
                Because the XML output can come from anywhere, this opens
                up the possibility of aggregating test runs from remote
                servers.
                A test case already exists to do this within the SimpleTest
                framework, but it is currently experimental...
<php><![CDATA[
<?php
<strong>require_once('../remote.php');</strong>
require_once('../reporter.php');
    
$test_url = ...;
$dry_url = ...;
    
$test = &new TestSuite('Remote tests');
$test->addTestCase(<strong>new RemoteTestCase($test_url, $dry_url)</strong>);
$test->run(new HtmlReporter());
?>
]]></php>
                The <code>RemoteTestCase</code> takes the actual location
                of the test runner, basically a web page in XML format.
                It also takes the URL of a reporter set to do a dry run.
                This is so that progress can be reported upward correctly.
                The <code>RemoteTestCase</code> can be added to test suites
                just like any other group test.
            </p>
        </section>
    </content>
    <internal>
        <link>
            Displaying <a href="#html">results in HTML</a>
        </link>
        <link>
            Displaying and <a href="#other">reporting results</a>
            in other formats
        </link>
        <link>
            Using <a href="#cli">SimpleTest from the command line</a>
        </link>
        <link>
            Using <a href="#xml">Using XML</a> for remote testing
        </link>
    </internal>
    <external>
        <link>
            SimpleTest project page on <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/simpletest/">SourceForge</a>.
        </link>
        <link>
            SimpleTest download page on <a href="http://www.lastcraft.com/simple_test.php">LastCraft</a>.
        </link>
        <link>
            The <a href="http://simpletest.org/api/">developer&apos;s API for SimpleTest</a>
            gives full detail on the classes and assertions available.
        </link>
    </external>
    <meta>
        <keywords>
            php unit testing,
            documentation,
            marcus baker,
            simple test,
            simpletest,
            remote testing,
            xml tests,
            automated testing
        </keywords>
    </meta>
</page>