Question

I have Struts 1 action and want to test it in isolation.
What this action do is as follows:

• load data using parameters from request
• build xml-based representation of this data
• send this response directly to client

I use jMock for testing but have one doubt here.
My first test is

public void shouldActionInvocationPrintValidResponse() {
    ProcessingAction action = new ProcessingAction();

    DBService service = mock(DBService.class);
    List records = new ArrayList();
    when(service.loadData()).thenReturn(records);

    ResponseBuilder builder = mock(ResponseBuilder.class);
    when(builder.buildResponse(records)).thenReturn("fake response");

    action.execute(null, null, null, null);

    assertEquals("fake response", writer.getContentWritten());
}

And my prod code evaluated to this:

public String execute(...) {
    List recordsList = service.loadData();
    String response = responseBuilder.buildResponse(recordsList);
    response.getWriter().print(response);
}

My doubt here is if such test isn’t too big here. I check whole succesful flow here. Shouldn’t there be separate tests for checking every single dependency call in their own tests?

I wonder because I had troubles with this test’s name. My ideas at the beginning were something like

shouldFetchDataThenFormatThemAndSendResponse

As this is all the tests does, the name shows it probably does too much (look at the “and” e.g. in the test name)

And should I have whole test written at once, or just add dependencies calls step-by-step?

EDIT:
Detailed code for test and action provided.

Answer 1

I think you are on the right track. shouldFetchDataThenFormatThemAndSendResponse This says it all. In your test naming you are talking about implementation details. This is how your first test should have been written.

ProcessingAction action = new ProcessingAction();

Response response = action.execute();

assertEquals(true, response.IsValid);

Try: shouldGetResponseWhenActionExecuted.

Now you can look at how to get a response when executing an action.

I would bet you dollars to donuts that you didn’t TDD this.

Remember: Intent over Implementation! Stop showing your crusty underwear.