[Python-Dev] How far to go with user-friendliness
Erik Bray
erik.m.bray at gmail.com
Mon Jul 20 20:30:17 CEST 2015
On Tue, Jul 14, 2015 at 6:22 PM, Robert Collins
<robertc at robertcollins.net> wrote:
> For clarity, I think we should:
> - remove the assret check, it is I think spurious.
> - add a set of functions to the mock module that should be used in
> preference to Mock.assert*
> - mark the Mock.assert* functions as PendingDeprecation
> - in 3.6 move the PendingDeprecation to Deprecated
> - in 3.7 remove the Mock.assert* functions and the check for method
> names beginning with assert entirely.
Hi all,
I'm just an onlooker, and haven't read every word of this thread. In
fact I worry that it's pointless to reply to rather than starting a
new thread. I just wanted to make sure that the specific message I'm
replying too wasn't lost in the noise because I think Robert's
suggestion makes vastly more sense than anything else I've seen here
(I came searching through the thread to see if anyone else suggested
this before I started a thread to do so).
I don't think it makes any sense to have magic assert_ methods on the
Mock object. Not only does the "magic" clearly lead to too many
ambiguities and other problems--I think they make less sense from an
API standpoint in the first place. Typically asserting something in a
test is not something an object *does*--a method. More often we as a
test writers assert something *about* an object. The assertion is an
external tool meant to measure and introspect things about the system
under observation. In this case, although Mock is itself a testing
tool, we're introspecting something about the Mock object as external
observers.
***Assertions on Mock objects should be implemented as stand-alone
functions (that happen to be used primarily on Mock objects as
input).***
Aside from, in my mind, making more sense philosophically, using
specialized assert functions for this has absolutely none of the
spelling ambiguities or other problems of the magic methods.
I'm -0 on removing the assret_ methods unless no one is using them
yet. I don't care if they're there as long as they're deprecated
along with the other magic methods of Mock.
Best,
Erik
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