Useful tools: NUnit, NAnt, and NGen
by Johannes Roith (johannes@jroith.de)
Contents
I. The NUnit testing framework
Introduction
NUnit is a unit-testing framework for all .Net languages. Initially ported from JUnit, the current version, 2.0 is the second major release of this xUnit based unit testing tool for Microsoft .NET. It is written entirely in C# and has been completely redesigned to take advantage of many .NET language features, for example custom attributes and other reflection related capabilities. NUnit brings xUnit to all .NET languages.
Commandline options
Content copied from nunit.org
Forms Interface
The forms interface has two command line options. If the program
is started without any command line parameters it automatically
loads the most recently loaded assembly. It does not automatically
run it just loads the assembly. The forms interface also keeps track
of the 5 most recently loaded assemblies. To access these see the
File->Recent Assemblies menu item.
The other option is to specify the assembly on the command line.
The following will start the forms interface with the assembly:
nunit.tests.dll
nunit-gui.exe /assembly:nunit.tests.dll
Console Interface
The console interface has a few additional options compared to the
forms interface. The console program must always specify a command
line parameter. The console interface always creates an XML representation
of the test results. This file by default is called
TestResult.xml
and is placed in the working directory.
Note: By default the nunit-console program is not added to your
path. You must do this manually if this is the desired behavior.
Specifying an Assembly
The console program must always have an assembly specified. To run
the tests contained in the nunit.tests.dll use the following command:
nunit-console /assembly:nunit.tests.dll
Specifying an Assembly and a Fixture
When specifying a a fixture, you must give the full name of the
test fixture along with the containing assembly. For example, to
run the NUnit.Tests.AssertionTests in the nunit.tests.dll assembly
use the following command:
nunit-console /fixture:NUnit.Tests.AssertionTests
/assembly:nunit.tests.dll
Specifying the XML file name
As stated above, the console program always creates an XML representation
of the test results. To change the name to "console-test.xml"
use the following command line option:
nunit-console /assembly:nunit.tests.dll /xml:console-test.xml
Specifying the Transform file
The console interface uses XSLT to transform the test results from
the XML file to what is printed to the screen when the program executes.
The console interface has a default transformation that is part
of the executable. To specify your own transformation named "myTransform.xslt"
use the following command line option:
nunit-console /assembly:nunit.tests.dll /transform:myTransform.xslt
Note: For additional information see the XML schema for the test
results. This file is in the same directory as the executable and
is called Results.xsd. The default transform
Summary.xslt is located
in the framework source directory.
II. The NAnt build tool
[TODO]
III. NGen - pre-compiling
This tool is still in heavy development.
[TODO]
