http://www.perlmonks.org?node_id=631475

As a result of a recent "lunch and learn" session I gave at my office (discussed a bit here), I've created a vim script that maps a couple of key commands to perform the following functions:

  1. Analyze the source code of a perl file you're editing in vim, and create a test file in a t/ subdirectory of your current working directory (assuming one doesn't already exist), with an appropriate use_ok() or require_ok() test for your module/script, and ok() tests for all subroutines found.
  2. Open a split view to that test file for quick and easy modification, to flesh out the test stubs automatically created.
  3. Run the test file.
  4. Generate a Makefile (assuming your system supports make).
  5. Running the targets in that Makefile, which includes running your code through Devel::Cover.

I talked about this vim plugin during a lightning talk at a recent Chicago Perl Mongers meeting, and got some good feedback. Some of the questions/comments I got were:

  1. Is this released/available anywhere? (it wasn't)
  2. Can this be ported to emacs? (most likely not, as it's all vimscript)
  3. It would be cool if it were a perl script so I could call it from emacs.

So, I sought to address these.

  1. I've released the vim script.
  2. I've created a perl module and released it to the CPAN.

The documentation and usage is available, but a quick synopsis of the module is:

use Test::StubGenerator; my $stub = Test::StubGenerator->new( { file => '/path/to/MyModule.pm', } ); print $stub->gen_testfile;

Or, from the command line (for ease of use for vim or emacs):

$ perl -MTest::StubGenerator -e ' > my $stub = Test::StubGenerator->new({ file => "Module.pm" } +); > print $stub->gen_testfile;' > Module.t

There are a few more options for writing the test stubs directly to file, or to a given directory. I also have it passing the tests through perltidy, just to make sure I'm not creating unreadable test text - though that can be disabled.

Of note, you'll need to have PPI installed, at least version 1.118. Anyone who's using Perl::Critic shouldn't have a problem with this. And of course, Perl::Tidy needs to be installed.

So, I'm asking for any commentary and/or suggestions for improvement. But please be gentle, as these are my first releases :)

Thanks in advance!


--chargrill
s**lil*; $*=join'',sort split q**; s;.*;grr; &&s+(.(.)).+$2$1+; $; = qq-$_-;s,.*,ahc,;$,.=chop for split q,,,reverse;print for($,,$;,$*,$/)