MEETINGS

DJUG LINKS

WIKI QUICK LINKS

Book Reviews

This book review was submitted by a DenverJUG member as part of the Book Review Program.

BOOK DETAILS

REVIEWER

Jay Punnackal

REVIEW

The first section of the book starts with the need and an introduction to the JUnit testing framework. The JUnit life cycle and the unit tests sequence flow are explained well with the aid of UML diagrams. Part II of the book discusses "Testing Strategies". Testing with stubs, with mock objects and within container are covered in detail. The third section of the book goes in detail on testing the various components - servlets and filters, JSP and taglibs, database applications and EJBs.

The book covers more than just the basics of JUnit. It provides an overview of different flavors (scopes) of software testing in general and unit testing in particular. It also provides an overview of Test Driven Development (TDD). The book covers integrating JUnit with other open source tools like Ant, Maven, Cactus and Eclipse. In other words, this is not just a "How to use JUnit" book. While it certainly does that, it also provides insight on how to make use of JUnit as an integral part in software development process. The significance of TDD and automated unit testing is highlighted in software development today, with project time frames getting shorter.

The book provides screen shots, diagrams and code samples wherever appropriate. The code samples and diagrams are "numbered" and referenced in the text description making it easier to refer back to the code or diagram from within the detailed explanation.

I also found the JUnit best practices which were scattered in all the sections very useful.

Summary
This is not a JUnit tutorial, it covers JUnit in depth. It also explains the importance of JUnit in the context of software development process. This well edited book is highly recommended both for the beginner and advanced users of JUnit.