Subj : Re: extreme programming (thoughts)
To   : comp.programming,comp.software.extreme-programming,comp.software-eng
From : Phlip
Date : Fri Jul 22 2005 12:41 am

matt wrote:

> oh, its TDD. i mean we think it is.. we have NUnit integrated into our
> IDE, have a test for each method, test the controls (.NET), NUnitASP
> for testing the pages, button clicks, etc... theres a lot of testing.
> but it sure isnt fast -- believe its 2 minutes to run all of proj's
> tests. lots of da layer interaction...

Hmm. TDD means you write failing tests, write code to pass the tests, and
refactor to improve design and test speed.

In this case, I think your biggest bottleneck is ASP's pathetic integration
with a server.

> definately not using the
> technique youve described for reserving db access to the build box.

When you reply with Google Groups, please use Preview->Edit to leave in the
replied-to text. I think your reply to John Roth.

> for instance, my first task was building a databound list control.

AAaarrg. Okay, you have three bottlenecks - databound controls, testing thru
the GUI to get to the business features, and ASP's HTTP/HTML round trip.

> much
> time was spent getting the specific relational data into the db, as my
> buddy explained we cant assume the data to be there. after doing that,

Did you ask your buddy why your test rig did not already have bottled
methods you could re-use to blast a standard database into the db layer?

> we wrote tests to test the data coming back from the proc's resultset.
> not sure how we'd do it otherwise -- dont we need to, you know, call
> the proc to test our new proc as well as the databinding?

Read this:

http://www.objectmentor.com/resources/articles/TheHumbleDialogBox.pdf

It says you should test the capacity of the GUI independent from the GUI,
meaning you should build an isolated, server-side module with the same shape
as the GUI, but no GUI controls in it.

The GUI Layer itself should be thin, and your biggest problem on this
project is the amount of crap you must write to test-thru the GUI.

So, in conclusion, you have discovered ASP sucks. XP just illustrated this
for you, so you decided to blame XP in hopes to go back to debugger-oriented
code-and-fix in ASP.

-- 
  Phlip
  http://www.c2.com/cgi/wiki?ZeekLand

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