dubioustests

dubioustests is a testing package for lazy typers with parentheses-phobia.

It essentially proposes shorthands for testthat functions, using a syntax powered by the doubt package, hence its name.

Install with :

remotes::install_github("moodymudskipper/dubioustests")

Note : this is just a proof of concept, I need to be happy with doubt first and submit it to CRAN before advising the use of any package based on it.

Examples

Let’s attach both dubioustests and testthat and review sets of equivalent calls.

library(testthat)
library(dubioustests, warn.conflicts = FALSE)

Test if a value is TRUE :

expect_true(is.numeric(2))
?~ is.numeric(2)

Test if two values are equal using all.equal()

expect_equal(tan(pi/4), 1)
?e~ tan(pi/4) ? 1

Test if two values are identical using identical()

expect_identical(tan(pi/4), 1)
#> Error: tan(pi/4) not identical to 1.
#> Objects equal but not identical
?i~ tan(pi/4) ? 1
#> Error: tan(pi/4) not identical to 1.
#> Objects equal but not identical

We can also use the infix notation and write tan(pi/4) ?i~ 1 instead of ?i~ tan(pi/4) ? 1

Wrap it up with %?%

%?% is testthat::test_that() but the description text comes first and we don’t need parentheses anymore.

Putting everything together we get :

"test that my functions work" %?% {
  ?~  is.numeric(2)
  ?e~ tan(pi/4) ? 1
}

Other aliases ?

The package doesn’t propose other aliases for testthat functions at the moment.

In many case the ?~ or ?e~ shorthands do the job just fine though. The two following expressions would only differ by the error message they would generate but they’re explicit either way.

test_that("a few things work as they should", {
  expect_length(4:6, 4)
  expect_gt(4, 5)
  expect_match("foobar","^bar")
})
#> Error: Test failed: 'a few things work as they should'
#> * 4:6 has length 3, not length 4.
#> * 4 is not strictly more than 5. Difference: -1
#> * "foobar" does not match "^bar".
#> Actual value: "foobar"

"a few things work as they should" %?% {
  ?~ length(4:6) == 4
  ?~ 4 > 5
  ?~ grepl("^bar","foobar")
}
#> Error: Test failed: 'a few things work as they should'
#> * length(4:6) == 4 isn't true.
#> * 4 > 5 isn't true.
#> * grepl("^bar", "foobar") isn't true.

And if needed we can easily define new dubious aliases :

`?len~` <- expect_length
`?err~` <- expect_error
?len~ 4:6 ? 4
#> Error: 4:6 has length 3, not length 4.
?err~ stop("foo error")
?err~ stop("foo error") ? "^foo"
?err~ stop("foo error") ? "^bar"
#> Error: `stop("foo error")` threw an error with unexpected message.
#> Expected match: "^bar"
#> Actual message: "foo error"