byterock

Yeah another test play-date here in the Dist-Pen.

Playing with testing and Dist::Zilla over the last few posts has not only introduced me to a the newer 'Perlish' way to ogranize your test cases but I have seen a good number of plug-ins that might be interesting for me to add into my '.ini' file. Now besides the two I really wanted and have added in '[Test::Kwalitee]' and '[Test::Perl::Critic]' I know very little about the others so I am just going to plow though them alphabetically.

So my first batch of test plug-ins for today are

• Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::CheckBreaks
• Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::CheckChanges
• Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::CheckDeps
• Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::CheckManifest
• Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::CleanNamespaces
• Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::Compile and
• Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::Compile::PerlFile

CheckBreaks
Well after a quick read this is not now for me at this stage as it provides a '/t' or 'Module' level test case that is set up to inform anyone trying to install the distribution that something will break if you do. Right now and most likely in the future I do not see Database::Accessor being used within something else so I can give this on a miss.

CheckChanges
This one provides a 'Release' test case that ensures that you have an entry in a 'Changes' file before you can release. As I already have [CheckChangeLog] plug-in install I would only be doing the same test twice so this one is out.

CheckDeps
Another plug-in that puts a 'Module' level test case in your distribution that will do a quick dependency test when installing. Now I already have the [AutoPrereqs] which should fix up my Make and Build '.PL' with the correct info to fail so I think I will give this one a miss as well.

CheckManifest
Another 'Release' test plug-in this time adding in a test to ensure that what is in the Manifest is in your distro and it does this my using 'Test::CheckManifest' under the hood. Again I have a plug-in that does that [Manifest] so why do things twice so this one is out

CleanNamespaces
Now here is one that I can use. It is an 'Author' test case that checks to see if I have any 'imported functions' that have not been removed. In the Moose world this is almost standard protace to clean out all the Moose-poop functions that are only useful at start up. So lets add this one into my '.ini' after I install it of course;

[Test::Perl::Critic]
critic_config = perlcritic.rc
++[Test::CleanNamespaces]
[Git::Check] 

and run with 'dzil xtest author' I get

xt/author/clean-namespaces.t .. Useless use of string in void context at /home/scolesj/database-accessor/.build/gnmxivC9Vg/blib/lib/Database/Accessor.pm line 109.

    #   Failed test 'Database::Accessor contains no imported functions'

    #   at /usr/local/share/perl/5.18.2/Test/CleanNamespaces.pm line 79.

    # remaining imports: {

    #   'after' => 'Moose::after',

    #   'around' => 'Moose::around',

    #   'augment' => 'Moose::augment',

…

No need to show the other sixty lines of output as I can see that all the Moose-poop that was left in as I have yet to add in namespace::autoclean or namespace::clean into my Accessor.pm. So this one is a keeper.

Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::Compile
Another 'Module' level test is provided by this plug-in and it will try and compile all the appropriate files in your Distro using only Core Perl. A great test if you are doing low level or universal modulus but not much use to me as Accessor.pm has strayed far off the Core path and finally;

Dist::Zilla::Plugin::Test::Compile::PerlFile
This is the evil twin of Test::Compile a much more extensive test case with all sorts of configurable bells and whistles, again not one I am going to use in this distribution.

Well it is only one hit for today 'CleanNamespaces' but at lest I can see another path you can take when using Dist::Zilla. The path I have chosen to do a number of things automajikaly and or if you do not like or cannot use the automajik route you can cover yourself by installing Test plug-in that will do the same job.