"Tanner Davis" <tanner.davis@innovision.com> wrote in message news:6704.32919073409$1180477224@news.gmane.org... Hello-

Hi, Tanner

What is the best practice for embedding test cases into library (versus executable) projects? I have successfully used the Boost.Test framework to build and create EXE targeted, testing specific (MSVS) projects. However, much of what I need to unit-test is compiled into a Win32 DLLs, and I would much rather > embed the test cases directly within that DLL project code (inside define blocks of course), rather than having to define a separate project to produce an EXE to execute the tests for each DLL. When I say "I would rather", it really means my manager demands it. It appears that the boost.test MACROs nicely obfuscate the normal main()-ish entry point for the testing. I have searched for information on overriding or extending the kick-off of whatever calls the init_unit_test_suite() so I could write my own custom entry points for testing the DLL as a post-build step, but have not found what I am looking for.

Boost 1.34.0 introduced new Boost.Test variant usage specifically for this case. It's called "external test runner usage variant". The idea is to build your test module as DLL (define BOOST_TEST_DYN_LINK during compilation). Now you can run the test modult using any external test runner tool. Boost.Test supply simple command line test runner: boost_test_runner utility (it's located in libs/test). What it does essenciallty is it loads DLL dynamically, init the framework and test tree and run all the registerred test cases.

So, my question is this. Is there a provided framework for testing code within a DLL project? And if not, is there a way to kick start the testing from a non- main method (say a custom DLL entry point), and would this strategy work within the confines of Boost.Test? I believe that other well known unit testing framework (which shall remain nameless) supports such a thing, and I would suspect Boost.Test does also.

I apologize if this question is often asked or obviously documented elsewhere. Thank you for the assistance.

The upcoming docs will cover this usage vasriants in more details. HTH, Gennadiy