Test-Driven Development: A Practical Guide: A Practical Guide

Out of the 3 books I have read about test driven development (TDD), this is by far the best. In fact, the other two were terrible. What's great about this book? It is easy to understand, even for someone who has never learned TDD before (like me). Also, it is extremely thorough. The book goes through the entire process of developing a complete (although simple) application. I think many authors would have just shown how TDD works with a variety of examples, but this book goes through the creation of the entire application, step by step. It's actually a very long book, 562 pages, with fairly small type. The desire to write the whole application when a set of examples would have been quicker and easier shows us that the author is really committed to being thorough. I guess that's what TDD is all about. Another great thing about the book is that although the lengthy application is written in Java, the book works for any object oriented language. I develop in C# and C++, and it is immediately obvious how to translate the Java to C# or C++. So the book really works for any object oriented language, as long as you have an intermediate level of ability so you can understand what he is doing. Besides that, there is a chapter on how to do TDD in a variety of languages: C#, C++, Smalltalk, Ruby, Python, and Visual Basic. Although I am a beginner at TDD, I would agree that the tests that the author describes may not test 100% of the code. However, I think his approach is probably more thorough and better than the vast majority of programmers'. Besides, I'm sure the tests can be expanded to provide better code coverage.

(Disclaimer: I worked with the author on one large project).Dave Astels' book is a comprehensive work covering TDD from the ground up to advanced topics. While most of the book examples use Java and JUnit, it does cover unit testing frameworks in several other languages as well. I've read two books on the topic (the other one is Kent Beck's "TDD By Example") and I liked Dave's book better. The basics of TDD can be explained in 10 minutes however when it is applied on practice it gets complicated in at least 3 areas: 1) testing UI 2) testing with database - data setup, isolation, etc. and 3) mocks. Kent's book is more about a philosophy of TDD but it only goes through a very simple "toy" example. Dave's book really helped me to understand mocks and it does cover UI testing in great length. Mocks are an advanced topic, so it does require a good knowledge of Java and OOP. The rest of the book seems to be on intermediate technical level.The only thing this book is missing, I think, is a discussion about data setup and database-related testing, dbUnit, etc., other than an advice to avoid it altogether (p. 83). While you can indeed use mocks to avoid it, on the large real projects some kind of integration testing (including testing with the database) will be necessary. I hope the second edition will come out at some point!Overall, it's a great book for both newcomers and developers with unit testing experience. BTW, it won SD West 2004 Jolt Award.

For the first time I now understand the following mock object related frameworks,- Mock Objects Framework- Mock Maker- Easy MockAlone, the chapter that explained these frameworks was well worth the purchase price of the book.

This book has changed the way I write software. It clearly states why you should do test-driven development and what tools are available, then backs this up with 200+ pages of how to do it with real code and text that captures the experience of developing a complex Java project test first.I'm a pragmatic person, so seeing the actual code and screenshots made concepts that I thought were difficult to achieve like writing tests before writing the implementation or testing GUIs (a subject that most people avoid) look surprisingly easy. All of the code in the book can be downloaded, but I found that it was more instructive to actually type in the code into an IDE. Following along with the project shows you how to proceed with test-driven development and what to expect. For example, you'll see when you need to refactor your tests or why you should test-drive most, but not all of your GUI code.After reading this book and implementing what I have learned in it, I absolutely agree with something that Ron Jeffries (another XP guru) wrote in the preface to this book: "If you're like me, using the techniques in [this] book, you will find that your programs are more clear, that they come into being more easily, and that you'll have fewer defects than you used to."

I have read Kent Beck's book also. That book is good, but this book really provides more practical advice on doing TDD development with JUnit. If you are using JUnit, then this book will provide tips, tricks, and strategies to using JUnit and other supplemental open source and commercial programs. The book has more than paid for itself already and I'm not finished reading it yet. If you are new to JUnit or TDD don't waste your time trying to come up the learning curve alone - buy this book.