Soon I will be involved in a project that will be using the agile project management/development approach, with 5 (or so) 2 week sprints. The project will be using a DDD design pattern which I have found in the past works great with unit testing, hence I have enthusiasim to use it for this project as well. The only problem is given the following factors I am unsure as to whether unit testing can be successfully implemented with agile development:
- Potential for constantly changing requirements (requirements change, tests break, tests need to be updated too).
- Time factor (unit tests can make dev take a fair bit longer and if requirements change towards the end of a sprint there may be too little time to update tests and production code at the best quality).
I have a feeling that if/when requirements change (especially if towards the end of a sprint) and given the tight deadlines unit tests will become a burden. Anyone have any good advice on the matter?
I think it cuts both ways. On one hand, yes, unit tests are extra code which requires extra maintenance, and will slow you down a bit. On the other hand, if requirements start evolving, having unit tests in place will be a life saver in making sure what you are changing still works.