I am delighted to announce that MSpec (Machine.Specifications) is now available for .NET Standard 1.3+ together with a new .NET CLI (dotnet test) test runner for .NET Core and .NET 4.5+.

If you are not sure what MSpec is - scroll down for a quick intro. In short it’s a “context/specification” test framework.

This is backwards compatible version, so there shouldn’t be any issues using this version with ReSharper, CodeRush or other test runners when targeting the .NET Framework.

Machine.Fakes.Moq is in beta due to the underlying Moq dependency not having yet a stable release for .NET Standard.

Useful Links

• MSpec documentation
• MSpec issue tracker

Getting started on .Net Core and .NET CLI

Here is an example project.json of a tests project which targets both .NET Core and .NET 4.5. As you can see it includes:

1. Dependency on Machine.Specifications and dotnet-test-mspec
2. "testRunner": "mspec"

project.json

{
    "testRunner": "mspec",
    "frameworks": {
        "net45": { },
        "netcoreapp1.0": {
            "dependencies": {
                "Microsoft.NETCore.App": {
                    "version": "1.*",
                    "type": "platform"
                }
            }
        }
    },
    "dependencies": {
        "FluentAssertions": "4.12.0",
        "Machine.Specifications": "0.11.0",
        "dotnet-test-mspec": "*"
    }
}

We can now use dotnet test to run the tests:

> dotnet test

Project Example (.NETCoreApp,Version=v1.0) was previously compiled. Skipping compilation.

dotnet-test-mspec: 0.2.0
Machine.Specifications: 0.11.0.0
Specs in Example:
...***

Contexts: 3, Specifications: 6, Time: 0.13 seconds
  3 passed, 0 failed, 3 not implemented

Project Example (.NETFramework,Version=v4.5) was previously compiled. Skipping compilation.

dotnet-test-mspec: 0.2.0
Machine.Specifications: 1.0.*
Specs in Example:
...***

Contexts: 3, Specifications: 6, Time: 0.09 seconds
  3 passed, 0 failed, 3 not implemented

SUMMARY: Total: 2 targets, Passed: 2, Failed: 0.

Known Issues with the dotnet cli (dotnet test) runner

1. IDE integration (aka Design-Time) is not yet implemented, so you won’t be able to see or run test in Visual Studio IDE: #303
2. The console output format doesn’t have colours and enough new line padding, etc. This is an upstream issue with dotnet test and hopefully will be fixed in the next preview. #311. This is potentially blocking the TeamCity and AppVeyor auto-detect outputs.

Hopefully they should land in v0.3 of the test runner.

What is MSpec?

MSpec is called a “context/specification” test framework because of the “grammar” that is used in describing and coding the tests or “specs”. That grammar reads roughly like this

When the system is in such a state, and a certain action occurs, it should do such-and-such or be in some end state.

You should be able to see the components of the traditional Arrange-Act-Assert model in there. To support readability and remove as much “noise” as possible, MSpec eschews the traditional attribute-on-method model of test construction. It instead uses custom .NET delegates that you assign anonymous methods and asks you to name them following a certain convention.

You can read more about MSpec in the docs here.

[Subject("Authentication")]
public class When_authenticating_an_admin_user
{
    Establish context = () => {
        Subject = new SecurityService();
    };

    Because of = () => {
        Token = Subject.Authenticate("username", "password");
    };

    It should_indicate_the_users_role = () => {
        Token.Role.ShouldEqual(Roles.Admin);
    };

    It should_have_a_unique_session_id = () => {
        Token.SessionId.ShouldNotBeNull();
    };

    static SecurityService Subject;
    static UserToken Token;
}

and an example of Machine.Fakes usage in MSpec:

[Subject("Authentication")]
public class When_authenticating_an_admin_user : WithFakes
{
    Establish context = () => {
        Subject = new SecurityService(The<SecurityClient>());

        The<SecurityClient>()
            .WhenToldTo(client => client.SendRequest(Param<string>.IsAny))
            .Returns(true);
    };

    Because of = () => {
        Subject.Authenticate("username", "password");
    };

    It should_request_a_token = () => {
        The<SecurityClient>()
            .WasTaldTo(client => client.RequestToken());
    };

    static SecurityService Subject;
}