Expectorant - RSpec for Python

A testing framework for Python 3.5 or later in the style of Ruby's RSpec. Here are the prominent features:

• Readable code --- Expectorant's syntax is easier to read than unittest and descriptions of intent are more prominent. No more functions named test_my_function_with_special_condition_x Instead situations and descriptions of the expected behavior are easy-to-read strings.

• Nested before/after functions --- Often there is common setup for a class, some specific setup for tests of a method, and more specific setup for a edge-cases. Expectorant organizes tests hierarchically to readably express your test structure.

• Repeat a test with different data --- Have you ever found yourself repeating test code over and over with just different data? E.g. square(1) == 1, square(2) == 4? Wouldn't it be clearer to pass in different data to the same test?

  input output
  ----- ------
  1     1
  2     4
  

  Expectorant's it clause can take a table (2D sequence) and the test is repeated over the rows.

• Simple custom matchers --- Matcher functions to compare you specific data types are only a few lines long.

• A failing check does not abort the test --- unittest and RSpec use assertions to signal a failure. Expectorant does not which means one test case can check several outputs and can show several failures. This was an intentional part of Unittest's design---you don't want side effects from one expectation distorting the results of another expectation. But we are all adults here---the programmer should be able to decide for herself when that is necessary. E.g. if you are only checking the contents of an immutable return value, there is no need run the subject over and over---the output is going to be the same in each run.

• Easy to modify output --- Currently there is one output format, but other formats such as JUnit XML for integration with CI servers would be easy.

A simple example of Expectorant style test:

from expectorant import *

@describe('expectorant')                                    # what is being specified in this file?
def _():                                                    # this line is a bit ugly but not too bad.
    scope = None

    @before                                                 # The setup function--called before each `it`
    def _():
        nonlocal scope                                      # Create an empty object for storing values
        scope = Scope()                                     # between `before` and `it`
        scope.dict = {'a': 'expectorant is like rspec', 'b': 3}

    @it('supports "expect" syntax similar to rspec')
    def _():
        expect(scope.dict['a']).to(contain, 'rspec')        # expectations are similar to RSpec.  `contain` is
                                                            # a matcher function--write your own in 3 lines.
    @it('expectations with == != < etc. operators are convenient syntactic sugar')
    def _():
        expect(scope.dict['b']) == 3

    @it('supports rspec\'s great "change" expectation')
    def _():
        expect(scope.dict.clear).to(change, lambda: len(scope.dict), frm=2, to=0)

Run all your specs from the command line, e.g. expectorant [filename | directory], or from a Python script:

import expectorant
expectorant.main(dirs_or_filenames_to_test)

The output looks like this:

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Requirements

• Python 3.5 --- we use: importlib.util.module_from_spec

Installation

pip3 install expectorant