My 14th Toolbox column in the February 2007 issue of MSDN Magazine is now avaiable online. The February issue examines three products:
This month's issue reviewed .NET Test Automation Recipes, by Dr. James D. McCaffrey. From the review:
All programs, regardless of their size, scope, or complexity, should be thoroughly tested to ensure correct results and behavior for both expected and unexpected inputs. Many developers employ commercial or open source testing frameworks to aid and automate the testing process. While testing frameworks have their place, in his book .NET Test Automation Recipes: A Problem-Solution Approach (Apress, 2006), fellow MSDN® Magazine columnist Dr. James D. McCaffrey proposes that these testing frameworks be complemented with lightweight test harnesses. A lightweight test harness is a short (four "pages" of source code or less), simple, standalone program written to perform a test or set of tests against the target app. ... Lightweight test harnesses are, by definition, simple and should not take significant time to develop. This time can be lessened by having the recipes discussed in Dr. McCaffrey's book at your fingertips.
As always, if you have any suggestions for products or books to review for the Toolbox column, please send them into toolsmm@microsoft.com.