Testing on the Visual Basic track

Learn how to test your Visual Basic exercises on Exercism

A downloaded exercise includes these files for building and testing your solution:

hello-world/
├── HelloWorld.vb          # Your solution
├── HelloWorldTests.vb     # The test suite
├── HelloWorld.vbproj      # Project and build configuration
└── packages.lock.json     # Resolved project dependencies

The filenames vary by exercise. Write your solution in the first .vb file. The second file ending in Tests.vb is the [xUnit test suite][xunit]. Generally, you'd only edit this to unskip subsequent tests. You will not need to edit either of the last two files. The .vbproj file contains the project's build settings and direct package references. The generated packages.lock.json file records the resolved direct and transitive package versions.

Note

The tests describe the behavior a passing solution must satisfy. They can help clarify details that are not covered by the instructions.

Run the tests

Open a terminal in the exercise directory and run:

dotnet test

The command restores the project's dependencies, builds the project, and runs its tests. You can also use dotnet watch test to rerun the tests whenever a source file changes.

Skipped tests

Exercises initially enable only the first test, allowing you to solve the rest one step at a time. Open the file ending in Tests.vb to find the tests. Each test is a Sub subroutine marked with an xUnit <Fact> attribute. A test will be skipped as long as its <Fact> attribute has a Skip argument:

<Fact(Skip:="Remove this Skip property to run this test")>
Public Sub Lowercase_words()
    Assert.Equal("ROR", Abbreviate("Ruby on Rails"))
End Sub

To enable the test, just remove the Skip argument:

<Fact>
Public Sub Lowercase_words()
    Assert.Equal("ROR", Abbreviate("Ruby on Rails"))
End Sub

After the newly enabled test passes, repeat this process with the next skipped test. When every test is enabled and passing, you're done.