UnitTest Framework - Assertion

Python testing framework uses Python's built-in assert() function which tests a particular condition. If the assertion fails, an AssertionError will be raised. The testing framework will then identify the test as Failure. Other exceptions are treated as Error.

The following three sets of assertion functions are defined in unittest module −

• Basic Boolean Asserts
• Comparative Asserts
• Asserts for Collections

Basic assert functions evaluate whether the result of an operation is True or False. All the assert methods accept a msg argument that, if specified, is used as the error message on failure.

Some of the above assertion functions are implemented in the following code −

import unittest

class SimpleTest(unittest.TestCase):
   def test1(self):
      self.assertEqual(4 + 5,9)
   def test2(self):
      self.assertNotEqual(5 * 2,10)
   def test3(self):
      self.assertTrue(4 + 5 == 9,"The result is False")
   def test4(self):
      self.assertTrue(4 + 5 == 10,"assertion fails")
   def test5(self):
      self.assertIn(3,[1,2,3])
   def test6(self):
      self.assertNotIn(3, range(5))

if __name__ == '__main__':
   unittest.main()

When the above script is run, test2, test4 and test6 will show failure and others run successfully.

FAIL: test2 (__main__.SimpleTest)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "C:\Python27\SimpleTest.py", line 9, in test2
      self.assertNotEqual(5*2,10)
AssertionError: 10 == 10

FAIL: test4 (__main__.SimpleTest)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "C:\Python27\SimpleTest.py", line 13, in test4
      self.assertTrue(4+5==10,"assertion fails")
AssertionError: assertion fails

FAIL: test6 (__main__.SimpleTest)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "C:\Python27\SimpleTest.py", line 17, in test6
      self.assertNotIn(3, range(5))
AssertionError: 3 unexpectedly found in [0, 1, 2, 3, 4]

----------------------------------------------------------------------            
Ran 6 tests in 0.001s                                                             
                                                                                  
FAILED (failures = 3)

The second set of assertion functions are comparative asserts −

• assertAlmostEqual (first, second, places = 7, msg = None, delta = None)

  Test that first and second are approximately (or not approximately) equal by computing the difference, rounding to the given number of decimal places (default 7),

• assertNotAlmostEqual (first, second, places, msg, delta)

  Test that first and second are not approximately equal by computing the difference, rounding to the given number of decimal places (default 7), and comparing to zero.

  In both the above functions, if delta is supplied instead of places then the difference between first and second must be less or equal to (or greater than) delta.

  Supplying both delta and places raises a TypeError.

• assertGreater (first, second, msg = None)

  Test that first is greater than second depending on the method name. If not, the test will fail.

• assertGreaterEqual (first, second, msg = None)

  Test that first is greater than or equal to second depending on the method name. If not, the test will fail

• assertLess (first, second, msg = None)

  Test that first is less than second depending on the method name. If not, the test will fail

• assertLessEqual (first, second, msg = None)

  Test that first is less than or equal to second depending upon the method name. If not, the test will fail.

• assertRegexpMatches (text, regexp, msg = None)

  Test that a regexp search matches the text. In case of failure, the error message will include the pattern and the text. regexp may be a regular expression object or a string containing a regular expression suitable for use by re.search().

• assertNotRegexpMatches (text, regexp, msg = None)

  Verifies that a regexp search does not match text. Fails with an error message including the pattern and the part of text that matches. regexp may be a regular expression object or a string containing a regular expression suitable for use by re.search() .

The assertion functions are implemented in the following example −

import unittest
import math
import re

class SimpleTest(unittest.TestCase):
   def test1(self):
      self.assertAlmostEqual(22.0/7,3.14)
   def test2(self):
      self.assertNotAlmostEqual(10.0/3,3)
   def test3(self):
      self.assertGreater(math.pi,3)
   def test4(self):
      self.assertNotRegexpMatches("Howcodex (I) Private Limited","Point")

if __name__ == '__main__':
   unittest.main()

The above script reports test1 and test4 as Failure. In test1, the division of 22/7 is not within 7 decimal places of 3.14. Similarly, since the second argument matches with the text in first argument, test4 results in AssertionError.

=====================================================FAIL: test1 (__main__.SimpleTest)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "asserttest.py", line 7, in test1
      self.assertAlmostEqual(22.0/7,3.14)
AssertionError: 3.142857142857143 != 3.14 within 7 places
================================================================
FAIL: test4 (__main__.SimpleTest)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "asserttest.py", line 13, in test4
      self.assertNotRegexpMatches("Howcodex (I) Private Limited","Point")
AssertionError: Regexp matched: 'Point' matches 'Point' in 'Howcodex (I)
Private Limited'
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Ran 4 tests in 0.001s                                                             
                                                                                  
FAILED (failures = 2)

Assert for Collections

This set of assert functions are meant to be used with collection data types in Python, such as List, Tuple, Dictionary and Set.

The following example implements the above methods −

import unittest

class SimpleTest(unittest.TestCase):
   def test1(self):
      self.assertListEqual([2,3,4], [1,2,3,4,5])
   def test2(self):
      self.assertTupleEqual((1*2,2*2,3*2), (2,4,6))
   def test3(self):
      self.assertDictEqual({1:11,2:22},{3:33,2:22,1:11})

if __name__ == '__main__':
   unittest.main()

In the above example, test1 and test3 show AssertionError. Error message displays the differences in List and Dictionary objects.

FAIL: test1 (__main__.SimpleTest)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "asserttest.py", line 5, in test1
      self.assertListEqual([2,3,4], [1,2,3,4,5])
AssertionError: Lists differ: [2, 3, 4] != [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

First differing element 0:
2
1

Second list contains 2 additional elements.
First extra element 3:
4

- [2, 3, 4]
+ [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
? +++       +++

FAIL: test3 (__main__.SimpleTest)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "asserttest.py", line 9, in test3
      self.assertDictEqual({1:11,2:22},{3:33,2:22,1:11})
AssertionError: {1: 11, 2: 22} != {1: 11, 2: 22, 3: 33}
- {1: 11, 2: 22}
+ {1: 11, 2: 22, 3: 33}
?              +++++++
                                                                                  
----------------------------------------------------------------------            
Ran 3 tests in 0.001s                                                             
                                                                                  
FAILED (failures = 2)