Fundamentals of Unit Testing and TDD as a practice and presentation of core features available with utPLSQL v3. Unit testing for Oracle Databases and PLSQL programming language.

1. utPLSQL v3
Ultimate Unit Testing framework for Oracle
Jacek Gębal
twitter: @GebalJacek
mail: jgebal@gmail.com
blog: oraclethoughts.com
Principal Data Engineer Developer
@Fidelity Investments - Ireland
co-author of: utPLSQL v3

2. Plan
● Oracle Database testing tools
● utPLSQL v3
● Rules of unit testing
● Test Driven Development with utPLSQL
● Testing data
● Test run options
● Suites
● utPLSQL - SQL Developer extension
● utPLSQL-cli - running tests from command line
● CI/CD integration

3. Steven Feuerstein
1999
PLUTO
PL/Unit
ruby-plsql-spec
DBFit
Oracle Database Unit Testing market

4. Market expectations

5. The team
● Jacek Gębal
● Pavel Kaplya
● Robert Love
● David Pyke
● Vinicius Avellar
● Samuel Nitsche
● Philipp Salvisberg

6. Why utPLSQL v3 ? ● free
● open source
● pure PL/SQL
● Tested on 11gR2 - 12cR2
● IDE independent
● database independent
● CI/CD oriented
● modular and extendable

7. Properties of
Unit Tests
● Fast
● Isolated
● Repeatable
● Self-verifying
● Thorough & Timely
https://github.com/.../F.I.R.S.T-Principles-of-Unit-Testing
https://pragprog.com/.../2012-01/unit-tests-are-first

8. The Unit Test
also needs to be
● Simple
● Automated
● Testing one behavior
● Living documentation
● Developer’s responsibility

9. Delivering software that is:
● Safe to change
● Maintainable
● Can be tested and delivered iteratively
Why should I
care ?

10. What to test in
database ?
● Behavior
○ Logic
○ in / out structure
○ State (?)
● Avoid
○ under-testing
○ over-testing
○ meaningless tests
○ flaky tests
○ aiming for metrics (coverage/test count)

11. Test Driven Development
● write a test
● make it fail
● keep it simple
● tests are examples
● tests become
documentation
● get to green fast
● take baby steps
● stuck?
undo and start over
● write only enough
code to pass the test
● remove duplication
(in code and tests)
● rename and clean up
● run tests and stay green
● change implementation,
not behavior
● improve structure
in small steps
RED GREEN
REFACTOR
With TDD you get:
● Fast feedback loop
● Visible progress
● Code is tested before it exists
● Accomplishment
with every new test

12. Test Driven Development
with utPLSQL v3
● suite structure
● annotations
● expectation syntax
● running tests
● failure and error messages

13. demo

14. Summary
Annotation syntax:
--%name( parameter[s] )
Example:
--%suite(description)
--%test(description)
Expectation examples:
ut.expect( 1 ).to_( equal( 1 ) );
ut.expect( ‘Chuck’ ).to_equal( ‘Chuck’ );
Running tests:
exec ut.run();

15. Annotations
Package:
● --%suite(<description>)
● --%suitepath(<path>)
● --%rollback(auto/manual)
● --%disabled
Test procedure:
● --%test(<description>)
● --%throws(<error_No>[,...])
● --%beforetest(<proc_name>)
● --%aftertest(<proc_name>)
● --%rollback(auto/manual)
● --%disabled
Procedure:
● --%beforeall, --%afterall
● --%beforeeach, --%aftereach

16. Expectations & matchers
● be_null
● be_true
● be_greater_than( expected )
● be_less_than( expected )
● equal( expected )
● be_like( mask [, escape_char] )
ut.expect( actual ).to_( matcher(param[, param...]) );
ut.expect( actual ).not_to( matcher(param[, param...]) );
● be_not_null
● be_false
● be_greater_or_equal( expected )
● be_less_or_equal( expected )
● be_between( lower, upper )
● match( pattern [, modifiers] )
● be_empty ● have_count( count )
Matchers:

17. Equality rules in tests
ut.expect( 100 ).to_equal( ‘100’ );
ut.expect( ‘abcdef’ ).to_equal( to_clob( ‘abcdef’ ) );
ut.expect( systimestamp ).to_equal( current_timestamp );
ut.expect( sysdate ).to_equal( ‘20-MAR-2018’ );
When it comes to unit testing ...
Data types matter!

18. Supported data-types
● clob, blob
● timestamp (with (local) timezone)
● interval (day to second / year to month)
● cursor
● object, nested table, varray type
● number (integer)
● varchar2 (char / varchar)
● date
● boolean

19. Testing data
● data setup / cleanup
● cursor data comparison
● automatic rollback
● selective comparison

20. demo

21. --%suite(Demo suite)
--%beforeall
procedure data_setup_before_all;
--%beforeeach
procedure thing_to_do_before_each_test;
--%test(Does a thing)
procedure test_the_thing;
--%test(Does stuff)
--%beforetest(setup_before_stuff)
--%aftertest(cleanup_after_stuff)
procedure test_stuff;
procedure setup_before_stuff;
procedure cleanup_after_stuff;
--%afterall
procedure cleanup_after_all_is_done;
data_setup_before_all
thing_to_do_before_each_test
test_the_thing
thing_to_do_before_each_test
setup_before_stuff
test_stuff
cleanup_after_stuff
cleanup_after_all_is_done
savepoint before_suite
Order of execution
savepoint before_test
rollback to before_suite
rollback to before_test
savepoint before_test
rollback to before_test
& test isolation

22. Organizing tests
● suites hierarchy with suitepath
● parent, siblings, ancestors
● shared beforeall / afterall
● suites isolation / setup scope

23. demo

24. package test_add_room_content as
--%suite(Add content to a room)
--%suitepath(org.utplsql.demo.test_rooms)
package test_remove_rooms_by_name as
--%suite(Remove rooms by name)
--%suitepath(org.utplsql.demo.test_rooms)
package test_rooms as
--%suite
--%suitepath(org.utplsql.demo)
package test_betwnstr as
--%suite(description)
savepoint
rollback to savepoint
Suite hierarchy test run
utplsql
test_betwnstr
test_rooms
test_add_room_content test_remove_rooms_by_name
org
demo
savepoint
rollback to savepoint
savepoint
rollback to savepoint

25. Test run options
● default options
● single schema
● single package
● single test
● suite
● multiple schema
● specifying reporter

26. demo

27. utPLSQL - SQL Developer extension

28. demo

29. utplsql-cli
● Windows/Linux/Mac
● real-time reporting
● multi-reporting
● Oracle client independent
● CI/CD oriented

30. demo

31. Integration
● CI/CD servers
○ Jenkins
○ TeamCity
○ Travis
○ other...
● Sonar
○ generic test results
○ code coverage
● Coveralls
○ code coverage

32. demo

33. utPLSQL v3 recap
● free, open-source, pure PL/SQL
● annotations
● human readable syntax
● data type - aware comparison
● automatic test isolation
● rich selection of matchers
● supports cursors, object types, nested tables
● CI/CD oriented
● code coverage

34. Resources
Cheat-sheet: https://www.cheatography.com/jgebal/cheat-sheets/utplsql-v3/
Documentation: http://utplsql.org/utPLSQL/
Source code: https://github.com/utPLSQL/utPLSQL
Releases: https://github.com/utPLSQL/utPLSQL/releases
utPLSQL-cli: https://github.com/utPLSQL/utPLSQL-cli/releases
SQLDeveloper-extension: https://github.com/utPLSQL/utPLSQL-SQLDeveloper/releases
Twitter: @utplsql
Demo project: https://github.com/utPLSQL/utPLSQL-demo-project
Sonar results: https://sonarcloud.io/dashboard?id=utPLSQL
Coveralls results: https://coveralls.io/github/utPLSQL/utPLSQL
Travis-CI builds: https://travis-ci.org/utPLSQL/utPLSQL