142 - 6 Ways to improve your code tests

How To Code Well

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6 ways to improve your testing

1) Automate as much as you can

• Use CI pipelines
• Run these locally even if your’e not committing any changes
• Include other code auditing tools such as phpstan or phpmd

2) Statics are evil

• There is no way to test a static method that calls another static method

3) Having many mocks is an indication of bad code design

4) Use tests to help refactor you code

• If a unit of work cannot be easily tested then it usually means the code is not designed well
• Break up your tests into smaller chunks
• Tests can highlight micro and minor refactors
• Refactor your code and then re test
• Try and do this in a TDD fashion

5) Avoid flaky tests

• Clean up state
• Check for bottle necks which could cause timeouts
• Mock external services or dependancies
• Look into potential memory leaks

6) Re think what testing means to you

• Testing is a contractual agreement between the programmer and the code
• Testing is documentation - Gherkin, Acceptance Criteria, Business requirements
• Testing is boundary setting which helps with focus
• Testing is future proofing

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