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Unit testing
This document describes how to write and test unit tests for Arm Mbed OS. To prevent and solve problems, please see the troubleshooting section.
Introduction
Unit tests test code in small sections on a host machine. Unlike other testing tools, unit testing doesn't require embedded hardware, and it doesn't need to build the full operating system. Because of this, unit testing can result in faster tests than other testing tools. Unit testing takes place in a build environment where we test each C or C++ class or module in isolation. This means we build test suites into separate test binaries and stub all access outside to remove dependencies on any specific embedded hardware or software combination. This allows us to complete the testing using native compilers on the build machine.
Prerequisites
Please install the following dependencies to use Mbed OS unit testing.
- GNU toolchains.
- GCC 6 or later. We recommend you use MinGW-W64 on Windows, but any Windows port of the above GCC versions works. Default compilers can be used on Mac OS instead of GCC to shorten build times, but code coverage results can then differ.
- CMake 3.0 or newer.
- Python 2.7.x, 3.5 or newer.
- Pip 10.0 or newer.
- Gcovr 4.1 or newer.
- Arm Mbed CLI 1.8.0 or newer.
Detailed instructions for supported operating systems are below.
Installing dependencies on Debian or Ubuntu
-
sudo apt-get -y install build-essential cmake -
Install Python and Pip with:
sudo apt-get -y install python python-setuptools sudo easy_install pip -
Install Gcovr and Mbed CLI with
pip install "gcovr>=4.1" mbed-cli.
Installing dependencies on macOS
-
Install Homebrew.
-
Install Xcode Command Line Tools with
xcode-select --install. -
Install CMake with:
brew install cmake. -
Install Python and Pip:
brew install python sudo easy_install pip -
Install Gcovr and Mbed CLI with
pip install "gcovr>=4.1" mbed-cli. -
(Optional) Install GCC with
brew install gcc.
Installing dependencies on Windows
- Download and install MinGW-W64 from SourceForge.
- Download CMake binaries from https://cmake.org/download/, and run the installer.
- Download Python 2.7 or Python 3 from https://www.python.org/getit/, and run the installer.
- Add MinGW, CMake and Python into system PATH.
- Install Gcovr and Mbed CLI with
pip install "gcovr>=4.1" mbed-cli.
Test code structure
Unit tests are located in the Mbed OS repository under the UNITTESTS folder. We recommend unit test files use an identical directory path to the file under test. This makes it easier to find unit tests for a particular class or a module. For example, if the file under test is some/example/path/ClassName.cpp, then all the test files are in the UNITTESTS/some/example/path/ClassName directory. Each test suite needs to have its own unittest.cmake file for test configuration.
All the class stubs should be located in the UNITTESTS/stubs directory. A single stub class can be used by multiple test suites and therefore should follow the naming convention of ClassName_stub.cpp for the source file and ClassName_stub.h for the header file. Use the actual header files for the unit tests and try not to stub headers if possible. The stubbed headers reside in the UNITTESTS/target_h directory.
Test discovery
Registering unit tests for running is automatic, and the test runner handles registration. However, test files are not automatically assigned to be built. We build unit tests by using a separate build system, which searches for unit tests under the UNITTESTS directory.
For the build system to find and build any test suite automatically, you must include a unit test configuration file named unittest.cmake for each unit test suite. This configuration file lists all the source files required for the test build.
Test names
The build system automatically generates names of test suites. The name is constructed by taking a relative file path from the UNITTESTS directory to the test directory and replacing path separators with dashes. For example, the test suite name for some/example/path/ClassName.cpp is some-example-path-ClassName. Suite names are used when deciding which test suites to run.
Unit testing with Mbed CLI
Mbed CLI supports unit tests through mbed test --unittests command. For information on using Mbed CLI, please see the CLI documentation.
Writing unit tests
A unit tests suite consists of one or more test cases. The test cases should cover all the functions in a class under test. All the external dependencies are stubbed including the other classes in the same module. Avoid stubbing header files. Finally, analyze the code coverage to ensure all the code is tested and no dead code is found.
Please see the documentation for Google Test to learn how to write unit tests using the framework. See the documentation for Google Mock if you want to write and use C++ mock classes instead of stubs.
Test suite configuration
Create two files in the test directory for each test suite:
- Unit test source file (
test_ClassName.cpp). - Unit test configuration file (
unittest.cmake).
List all the files required for the build in the unittest.cmake file. You will need to list the file paths relative to the UNITTESTS folder. Use the following variables to list the source files and include paths:
- unittest-includes - List of header include paths. You can use this to extend or overwrite default paths listed in
UNITTESTS/CMakeLists.txt. - unittest-sources - List of files under test.
- unittest-test-sources - List of test sources and stubs.
You can also set custom compiler flags and other configurations supported by CMake in unittest.cmake.
Example
With the following steps, you can write a simple unit test. In this example, rtos/Semaphore.cpp is a class under test.
-
Create a directory for unit test files in
UNITTESTS/rtos/Semaphore. -
Create a test configuration file
UNITTESTS/rtos/Semaphore/unittest.cmakewith the following content:set(unittest-sources ../rtos/Semaphore.cpp ) set(unittest-test-sources stubs/mbed_assert_stub.c stubs/Kernel_stub.cpp rtos/Semaphore/test_Semaphore.cpp ) -
Stub all external dependencies. Create stubs
UNITTESTS/stubs/mbed_assert_stub.candUNITTESTS/stubs/Kernel_stub.cppif they do not exist. -
Update header stubs with any missing type or function declarations.
-
Create a test source file
UNITTESTS/rtos/Semaphore/test_Semaphore.cppwith the following content:
#include "gtest/gtest.h"
#include "rtos/Semaphore.h"
static osStatus_t retval = osOK;
static uint32_t count = 0;
// Test stubs
osStatus_t osSemaphoreAcquire(osSemaphoreId_t semaphore_id, uint32_t timeout)
{
return retval;
}
osStatus_t osSemaphoreDelete(osSemaphoreId_t semaphore_id)
{
return retval;
}
osStatus_t osSemaphoreRelease(osSemaphoreId_t semaphore_id)
{
return retval;
}
uint32_t osSemaphoreGetCount(osSemaphoreId_t semaphore_id)
{
return count;
}
osSemaphoreId_t osSemaphoreNew(uint32_t max_count, uint32_t initial_count, const osSemaphoreAttr_t *attr)
{
return (void *)&count; // Just a dymmy reference
}
class TestSemaphore : public testing::Test {
protected:
rtos::Semaphore *sem;
virtual void SetUp()
{
sem = new rtos::Semaphore();
}
virtual void TearDown()
{
delete sem;
}
};
TEST_F(TestSemaphore, constructor)
{
EXPECT_TRUE(sem);
}
Building and running unit tests
Use Mbed CLI to build and run unit tests. For advanced use, you can run CMake and a Make program directly.
Build tests directly with CMake
- Create a build directory
mkdir UNITTESTS/build. - Move to the build directory
cd UNITTESTS/build. - Run CMake using a relative path to
UNITTESTSfolder as the argument. So fromUNITTESTS/buildusecmake ..:- Add
-g [generator]if generating other than Unix Makefiles such in case of MinGW use-g "MinGW Makefiles". - Add
-DCMAKE_MAKE_PROGRAM=<value>,-DCMAKE_CXX_COMPILER=<value>and-DCMAKE_C_COMPILER=<value>to use a specific Make program and compilers. - Add
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debugto build a debug build. - Add
-DCOVERAGE=Trueto add coverage compiler flags. - See the CMake manual for more information.
- Add
- Run a Make program to build the tests.
Run tests directly with CTest
Run a test binary in the build directory to run a unit test suite. To run multiple test suites at once, use CTest test runner. Run CTest with ctest. Add -v to get results for each test case. See the CTest manual for more information.
Run tests with GUI test runner
- Install gtest-runner using the documentation.
- Run gtest-runner
- Add test executables into the list.
- Run them.
Debugging
- Use Mbed CLI to build a debug build. For advanced use, run CMake directly with
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug, and then run a Make program. - Run GDB with a test executable as an argument to debug unit tests.
- Run tests with Valgrind to analyze test memory profile.
Get code coverage
Use Mbed CLI to generate code coverage reports. For advanced use, follow these steps:
- Run CMake with both
-DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debugand-DCOVERAGE=True. - Run a Make program to build the tests.
- Run the tests.
- Run Gcovr or any other code coverage tool directly in the build directory.
Troubleshooting
Problem: Generic problems with CMake or with the build process.
- Solution: Delete the build directory. Make sure that CMake, g++, GCC and a Make program can be found in the path and are correct versions.
Problem: (Windows) Virus protection identifies files generated by CMake as malicious and quarantines the files.
- Solution: Restore the false positive files from the quarantine.
Problem: (Windows) Git with shell installation adds sh.exe to the path and then CMake throws an error: sh.exe was found in your PATH. For MinGW make to work correctly sh.exe must NOT be in your path.
- Solution: Remove sh.exe from the system path.
Problem: (Mac OS) CMake compiler check fails on Mac OS Mojave when using GCC-8.
- Solution: Make sure gnm (binutils) is not installed. Uninstall binutils with
brew uninstall binutils.