Sessions at PyCon US 2011 about Testing

Friday 11th March 2011

• PyCon 2011: Supporting All Versions of Python All The Time With Tox

  by Kumar McMillan

  This talk explains modern techniques that any developer can use to support multiple versions of Python. You probably already have a massive test suite using a tool like nosetests, py.test, hand rolled unittest, etc. This talk will focus on using the tox command line tool to build and run your tests in all versions of Python, from 2.4 to Jython and, most importantly, Python 3.

  tox lets you set up isolated virtual environments to test your module's deployment and compatibility with all major versions of Python. It's easy to install and is flexible enough that it probably already supports your existing test suite. With one simple command you can execute your test suite in each version of Python, you can build its documentation with Sphinx, and get a nice printout of the results. It has also been designed from the ground up to integrate into continuous integration (CI) tools like Jenkins.

  Using practical examples, this talk will show you how to toxify your existing test suite and trick it out with the tox.ini config file. You'll also see how to leverage a Jenkins matrix build so that each code checkin will run tests in all versions of Python and report detailed failures.

  Your app supports Python 3, right? No? Tox is the best way to develop in parallel with 2 and 3. We'll go over how to set up tox for that.

  • Python
  • Python 3
  • Testing

  At 11:45am to 12:15pm, Friday 11th March

  Coverage video slide deck