Question

I have a problem with an integration test I am writing. I need to perform cleanup at the end of the test by removing the categories (from the list of available categories) in Outlook that I have added during the test. I do this as follows for the ‘Filed’ category:

using Microsoft.Office.Interop.Outlook;

var outlookApplication = new Application();
outlookApplication.Session.Categories.Remove("Filed");

This fails to remove the category, but not consistently. When I debug the code it works but not when I run the tests.

UPDATE:
Here’s all the test code:

[TestFixture]
public class BootstrapperTest
{
    private bool containsFiled;
    private bool containsPending;
    private Application outlookApplication = new Application();

    [Test]
    public void CanCreateFiledCategory()
    {
        var bootstrapper = new Bootstrapper();
        bootstrapper.LoadCategoriesIntoOutlook(outlookApplication); 
        var filedCategoryFound = outlookApplication.Session.Categories.Cast<Category>().Any(category => category.Name == "Filed");
        Assert.That(filedCategoryFound, Is.EqualTo(true));
    }

    [Test]
    public void CanCreatePendingCategory()
    {
        var bootstrapper = new Bootstrapper();
        bootstrapper.LoadCategoriesIntoOutlook(outlookApplication); 
        var pendingCategoryFound = outlookApplication.Session.Categories.Cast<Category>().Any(category => category.Name == "Pending");
        Assert.That(pendingCategoryFound, Is.EqualTo(true));
    }

    [SetUp]
    public void Setup()
    {
        containsFiled = DoesCategoryNameExist(outlookApplication.Session.Categories, "Filed");
        containsPending = DoesCategoryNameExist(outlookApplication.Session.Categories, "Pending");
    }

    [TearDown]
    public void TearDown()
    {
        RemoveAllCategoriesFromOutlook();
    }

    private bool DoesCategoryNameExist(Categories categoryList, string categoryName)
    {
        return categoryList.Cast<Category>().Any(category => category.Name == categoryName);
    }

    private void RemoveAllCategoriesFromOutlook()
    {
        var containsFiledNow = DoesCategoryNameExist(outlookApplication.Session.Categories, "Filed");
        var containsPendingNow = DoesCategoryNameExist(outlookApplication.Session.Categories, "Pending");
        if (!containsFiled && containsFiledNow) outlookApplication.Session.Categories.Remove("Filed");
        if (!containsPending && containsPendingNow) outlookApplication.Session.Categories.Remove("Pending");
    }
}

And the method it is testing:

public void LoadCategoriesIntoOutlook(Application outlookApplication)
{
    var categories = outlookApplication.Session.Categories;

    var filedCategoryNameExists = DoesCategoryNameAlreadyExist(categories, FiledCategoryName);
    var pendingCategoryNameExists = DoesCategoryNameAlreadyExist(categories, PendingCategoryName);
    var filedCategoryColourIsUsed = IsCategoryColorAlreadyUsed(categories, FiledCategoryColor);
    var pendingCategoryColourIsUsed = IsCategoryColorAlreadyUsed(categories, PendingCategoryColor);

    if (!filedCategoryNameExists)
    {
        if (filedCategoryColourIsUsed)
        {
            var categoryToBeChangedToFiled =
                    categories.Cast<Category>()
                              .Where(category => category.Color == FiledCategoryColor)
                              .FirstOrDefault();
            categoryToBeChangedToFiled.Name = FiledCategoryName;
        }
        else
        {
            categories.Add(FiledCategoryName, FiledCategoryColor);
        }
    }

    if (!pendingCategoryNameExists)
    {
        if (pendingCategoryColourIsUsed)
        {
            var categoryToBeChangedToPending =
                   categories.Cast<Category>()
                             .Where(category => category.Color == PendingCategoryColor)
                             .FirstOrDefault();
            categoryToBeChangedToPending.Name = PendingCategoryName;
        }
        else
        {
            categories.Add(PendingCategoryName, PendingCategoryColor);
        }
    }
}

Answer 1

You should log whether Categories.Remove is even called (via Trace.TraceInformation()) to see if there is an error in your branch condition when run in non-DEBUG mode. Categories.Remove does work reliably, it must be an error in your condition. If so, you won’t see the logging statements.

private void RemoveAllCategoriesFromOutlook()
{
        var containsFiledNow = DoesCategoryNameExist(outlookApplication.Session.Categories, "Filed");
        var containsPendingNow = DoesCategoryNameExist(outlookApplication.Session.Categories, "Pending");
        if (!containsFiled && containsFiledNow) 
        {
            outlookApplication.Session.Categories.Remove("Filed");
            Trace.TraceInformation("Deleted Filed Category!")
        }
        if (!containsPending && containsPendingNow) 
        {
            outlookApplication.Session.Categories.Remove("Pending");
            Trace.TraceInformation("Deleted Pending Category!")
        }
}

Also, since you create Categories based off of color (see filedCategoryColourIsUsed), containsFiled may return FALSE, even though you created it via rename (Category.Name = "Filed"), not via Categories.Add(). Your issue is that DoesCategoryNameExist does not consider category color during your Setup test fixture. The following Setup() code should correct this problem…

[SetUp]
public void Setup()
{
    containsFiled = DoesCategoryNameExist(outlookApplication.Session.Categories, "Filed") || IsCategoryColorAlreadyUsed(categories, FiledCategoryColor);
    containsPending = DoesCategoryNameExist(outlookApplication.Session.Categories, "Pending") || IsCategoryColorAlreadyUsed(categories, PendingCategoryColor);
}