[TIP] Test Parameterization with unittest

[Michael Foord]

Robert Collins wrote:
> On Mon, 2009-05-11 at 17:33 +0100, Michael Foord wrote:
>
>   
>> Yeah - that's a nicer API for having multiple scenarios in a single test 
>> class. I'll read about it and propose something for unittest.
>>     
>
> I'd be happy to just include it in the stdlib.
>
> -Rob
>   
Scenarios seem very good for interface testing (when you want to run a 
whole set of tests against different backend implementations of the same 
interface).

They are not an equivalent of generative tests, which people seem to 
like from nose / py.test.

I'm also not wild about specifying a dictionary of parameters which then 
'magically' become instance attributes. It would make me antsy writing 
tests that use attributes which don't exist until they are stuck onto 
the instance.

I like the *mechanism* of TestWithScenarios though. I'd prefer to 
specify a test method and have it called with arguments from the 
scenario. I might update my metaclass recipe to do something like this. 
Although it isn't suitable for going into unittest.py it is perfectly 
usable.

I wonder which is more generally needed in unittest - generative tests 
or interface tests?

As I don't have a personal need for *either* I think I should avoid 
trying to push something into the standard library. It is a subject to 
revisit as it seems like a gap in unittest.

Michael Foord

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