[py-dev] Information for unittest refugees

[Orestis Markou]

After attending Holger's talk at PyCon UK about py.test, I decided to  
try it out. I'm using a recent svn checkout.

I had a bunch of tests (around 50 of them), all inheriting from  
unittest. I expected that they would work out of the box with py.test,  
and was surprised when they weren't. I tried adding the py_unittest  
conftest.py file to my project, but I got this traceback:

Traceback (most recent call last):
   File "/opt/local/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/ 
Current/bin/py.test", line 8, in <module>
     load_entry_point('py==1.0.0a1', 'console_scripts', 'py.test')()
   File "/Users/orestis/Developer/pylib/py/cmdline/pytest.py", line 5,  
in main
     py.test.cmdline.main()
   File "/Users/orestis/Developer/pylib/py/test/cmdline.py", line 12,  
in main
     config.parse(args)
   File "/Users/orestis/Developer/pylib/py/test/config.py", line 46,  
in parse
     self._conftest.setinitial(args)
   File "/Users/orestis/Developer/pylib/py/test/conftesthandle.py",  
line 30, in setinitial
     self._path2confmods[None] = self.getconftestmodules(anchor)
   File "/Users/orestis/Developer/pylib/py/test/conftesthandle.py",  
line 44, in getconftestmodules
     clist.append(importconfig(conftestpath))
   File "/Users/orestis/Developer/pylib/py/test/conftesthandle.py",  
line 74, in importconfig
     mod = configpath.pyimport()
   File "/Users/orestis/Developer/pylib/py/path/local/local.py", line  
413, in pyimport
     mod = __import__(modname, None, None, ['__doc__'])
   File "/Users/orestis/Developer/pysmell/conftest.py", line 52, in  
<module>
     class UnitTestFunction(py.__.test.item.Function):
AttributeError: 'module' object has no attribute 'item'

I expected that the naming conventions would be enough, but I was  
surprised again by the fact that py.test requires "test_" methods  
rather than just "test" methods. Fixing that, I was again surprised  
that my tests still weren't running, and after some guesswork realized  
that the class they were in didn't start with "Test".

I suggest that you add this crucial information in a more clear way  
(it is there, but not very discoverable) or even better, integrate the  
py_unittest collection into py.test - this way people can try out  
their old tests with py.test, rather than having to convert everything.

Best regards,
Orestis Markou
--
orestis at orestis.gr
http://orestis.gr/