Question

I have a ArticleController that displays a list of articles according to a category.

public ActionResult List(string categoryname)
{
       MyStronglyTypedViewData vd = new MyStronglyTypedViewData();

       DBFactory factory = new DBFactory();

       categoryDao = factory.GetCategoryDao();
       articleDao = factory.GetArticleDao();


       vd.Category = categoryDao.GetByName(categoryname);
       vd.Articles = articleDao.GetByCategoryId(vd.Category.Id);


       return View(vd);
}

If I was to unit test this action, what exactly would be the purpose?
TO make sure the correct view is being opened?

Answer 1

1. Make sure that a ViewResult is returned
2. Make sure the view result has a model
3. Make sure this model is not null and is of type MyStronglyTypedViewData
4. Assert properties on the model

This line DBFactory factory = new DBFactory(); makes me think that it would be difficult to write a unit test because you don’t use an interface that could be mocked, but rather rely on a concrete class which might hit the actual database.