[Tip Jar] Unit Test Events With Anonymous Delegates

Here we are already looking ahead to learn about the language features of C# 3.0 and I am still finding new ways to make my code better with good “old fashioned” C# 2.0.

Like many people, I tend to fall into certain habits of writing code. For example, today I was writing a unit test to test the source of a particular event. I wanted to make sure that the event is raised and that the event arguments were set properly. Here’s the test I started off with (some details changed for brevity) which reflects how I would do this in the old days.

private bool eventRaised = false;

[Test]
public void SettingValueRaisesEvent()
{
    Parameter param = new Parameter("num", "int", "1");
    param.ValueChanged += OnValueChanged;
    parameter.Value = "42"; //should fire event.

    Assert.IsTrue(eventRaised, "Event was not raised");
}

void OnValueChanged(object sender, ValueChangedEventArgs e)
{
    Assert.AreEqual("42", e.NewValue);
    Assert.AreEqual("1", e.OldValue);
    Assert.AreEqual("num", e.ParameterName);
    eventRaised = true;
}

A couple of things rub me the wrong way with this code.

First, I do not like relying on the member variable eventRaised because another test could inadverdently set that value, unless I make sure to reset it in the SetUp method. So now I need a SetUp method.

Second, I don’t like the fact that this test requires this separate event handler method, OnValueChanged. Ideally, I would prefer that the unit test be self contained as much as possible.

Then it hits me. Of course! I should use an anonymous delegate to handle that event. Here is the revised version.

[Test]
public void SettingValueRaisesEvent()
{
    bool eventRaised = false;
    Parameter param = new Parameter("num", "int", "1");
    param.ValueChanged += 
        delegate(object sender, ValueChangedEventArgs e)
        {
            Assert.AreEqual("42", e.NewValue);
            Assert.AreEqual("1", e.OldValue);
            Assert.AreEqual("num", e.ParameterName);
            eventRaised = true;
        };
    param.Value = "42"; //should fire event.

    Assert.IsTrue(eventRaised, "Event was not raised");
}

Now my unit test is completely self-contained in a single method. Lovely!

In general, I try not to use anonymous delegates all over the place, especially delegates with a lot of code. I think they can become confusing and hard to read. But this is a situation in which I think using an anonymous delegate is particularly elegant.

Contrast this approach to the approach using Rhino Mocks I wrote about a while ago. In that scenario, I was testing that a subscriber to an event handles it properly. In this case, I am testing the event source.

[Tip Jar] Unit Test Events With Anonymous Delegates

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