A couple ways I test my .NET APIs

Recently I have undertaken some work that required either building a whole new API or regression testing another API.

Through that experience I used 3 techniques to help build my confidence that what I was building actually worked, these are:

• Unit Tests
• In Memory API Tests with WebApplicationFactory<TEntryPoint>
• Newman Tests

I will assume that everyone is familiar with unit tests in C# but just a quick note that my favourite framework is XUnit. I really enjoy the simplicity that it brings and allows me to get up and running super quickly.

In Memory API Tests with WebApplicationFactory<TEntryPoint>

tl;dr;

Check out this GitHub repo

https://github.com/GrantHair5/DotNetApiInMemoryTests

It has some pretty nice examples at a very basic level I'm taking lets get some fruit from a basket kinda stuff.

How?

The MVP of this test is WebApplicationFactory<TEntryPoint> it allows me to run an in-memory version of my API using TestServer this gives me access to a HttpClient and also my actual API. I can then send HTTP calls to my API as I would do in real life and assert the responses.

This is a great time to plug one of my favourite NuGet packages, FluentAssertions. It gives you the ability to assert test cases using plain English style language and makes complex test assertions a breeze.

Anyways,

To use WebApplicationFactory<TEntryPoint>

You would write something like the following:

public class ApiWebApplicationFactory : WebApplicationFactory<Startup>
    {
        protected override void ConfigureWebHost(IWebHostBuilder builder)
        {
            builder.ConfigureTestServices(services =>
            {
                services.AddTransient<IFruitBasket, StubbedFruitBasket>();
            });
        }
    }

ApiWebApplicationFactory will become your new best friend.

Basically this is allowing us to override the default implementation of IFruitBasket with our new StubbedFruitBasket perfect for testing stuff with.

Then I inherit ApiWebApplicationFactory into my next best friend IntegrationTestBase which I use across each of my integration tests to get access to that sweet sweet in memory API.

 public class IntegrationTestBase : IClassFixture<ApiWebApplicationFactory>
    {
        protected readonly ApiWebApplicationFactory Factory;
        protected readonly HttpClient Client;

        public IntegrationTestBase(ApiWebApplicationFactory fixture)
        {
            Factory = fixture;
            Client = Factory.CreateClient();
        }
    }

Then my tests look something like this:

 public class FruitApiShould : IntegrationTestBase
    {
        public FruitApiShould(ApiWebApplicationFactory fixture) : base(fixture)
        {
        }

        [Fact]
        public async Task Return_Two_Fruits_From_Stubbed_Basket()
        {
            var response = await Client.GetAsync("/api/Fruit/Basket");
            response.StatusCode.Should().Be(HttpStatusCode.OK);

            var basket = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<IEnumerable<Fruit>>(await response.Content.ReadAsStringAsync());
            basket.Should().HaveCount(2);
        }
}

If I want to override the stubbed implementation of my IFruitBasket I can do this by using my ApiWebApplicationFactory Factory from IntegrationTestBase to call Factory.WithWebHostBuilder() like so:

[Fact]
        public async Task Return_Four_Fruits_From_Real_Basket_Overriden_By_With_Web_Host_Builder()
        {
            // WithWebHostBuilder will allow us to override the base Client with any new services that we require.
            var client = Factory.WithWebHostBuilder(builder =>
            {
                builder.ConfigureServices(services =>
                {
                    services.AddTransient<IFruitBasket, FruitBasket>();
                });
            }).CreateClient();

            var response = await client.GetAsync("/api/Fruit/Basket");
            response.StatusCode.Should().Be(HttpStatusCode.OK);

            var basket = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<IEnumerable<Fruit>>(await response.Content.ReadAsStringAsync());
            basket.Should().HaveCount(4);
        }

Simple right 👍

Some things to note

1: services.ConfigureTestServices() is called after services.ConfigureServices() in the natural pipeline allowing us to override implementations or configuration or databases etc.

2: The above is obviously not a real life implementation and should be used as a guide, any terrible code is not a reflection of my real life performance 😂

Newman Tests

I have probably already bored you to death so I'll just drop a tl;dr; here

tl;dr;

Newman is an NPM package

It allows you to run many http requests from a postman collection

You can write JavaScripty style tests against your collections, for me these were:

Is my status code 200

Is my JSON response what I expect it to be

It is super cool and helpful.

It saved me so much time as I didn't have to hit over 120 endpoints individually.

Check out this link for more info:

https://learning.postman.com/docs/running-collections/using-newman-cli/command-line-integration-with-newman/

Hope this was of help

See Ya 👋