Lightning Talk: a test code generator for RSpec users
Kazuhiro Sera • Koto-ku, Tokyo, Japan • Lightning Talk

Date: May 31, 2013
Published: June 21, 2013
Announced: unknown

rspec-kickstarter is a test code generator for RSpec users.

https://github.com/seratch/rspec-kickstarter

TDD is a very useful approach but actually many projects are not fully TDD-based and we sometimes need to face apps that don't have enough coverage. In such a situation, I believe that this tool is especially useful.

It's easy to say "You should write tests for the legacy code before modifying it" but it's not always easy to keep the motivation to do the right thing because developers have many things to do before they start writing essential parts of test. It's messy to create a new file or figure out the existing spec file, find out what the lacking test cases are and write routine stuff which starts with 'describe'.

rspec-kickstarteer enables developers writing test immediately. If the spec is absent, it generates a new spec template file. Furthermore, it appends lacking test cases (with TODO comments) to existing the spec file if they're found.

I know that testing for methods is not perfect but it's pretty important to reduce the psychological barrier.

I'll show some examples about rspec-kickstarter in this talk.

RubyKaigi 2013