NAME

HTTP::WebTest::Plugins - Plugin developers documentation.

SYNOPSIS

Not applicable.

DESCRIPTION

This document is the starting point for developers who wish to extend HTTP::WebTest functionality with external plugins.

ABOUT PLUGINS

Plugin can be used to add new test types and add new report types. A plugin is just a Perl package that defines class with a number of methods which if present are called by HTTP::WebTest at various stages of test.

Each plugin package should subclass HTTP::WebTest::Plugin. Report plugins can subclass HTTP::WebTest::ReportPlugin which is a subclass of HTTP::WebTest::Plugin. HTTP::WebTest::ReportPlugin defines some helper methods useful in report plugins and handles some test parameters common for report plugins.

REQUIRED METHODS

Each plugin package must provide following method:

param_types

Returns

A string that contains information about supported test parameters and their types.

String has following format:

    PARAM1 TYPE1 PARAM2 TYPE2 PARAM3 TYPE3 ... PARAMN TYPEN

PARAM is the name of a test parameter and TYPE is it's type specification. They should be separated by a whitespace character.

Each test parameter type is defined by a method in HTTP::WebTest::Plugin. Type "foobar" is defined as method "check_foobar" in this package. See its documentation for list of all "check_****" methods - these methods define all known test types.

Example

    sub param_types {
        return q(ignore_case   yesno
                 text_forbid   list
                 text_require  list
                 regex_forbid  list
                 regex_require list);
    }

This is from HTTP::WebTest::Plugin::TextMatchTest. It defines the test parameters "ignore_case", "text_forbid", "text_require", "regex_forbid" and "regex_require". "yesno" and "list" are test parameter types.

OPTIONAL METHODS

Each plugin package may provide following methods:

start_tests ()

Called before runing test sequence. Initializations can be done in this method. Report plugins can use this hook to create the report header.

end_tests ()

Called when test sequence is finished. Clean-up and finalization can be done in this method. Report plugins can use this hook to finish the report.

prepare_request ()

Called just before HTTP::WebTest submits the HTTP request. Various properties of request can be set here.

check_response ()

Called after HTTP::WebTest gets the HTTP response. Web page tests should be placed here.

report_test ()

Called after all HTTP::WebTest <check_response> hooks are called. Normally used by report plugins to generate report about test just done.

Returns

These methods should return results of tests made in the following form:

    [ [ TEST_GROUP1_NAME, TEST_RESULT1, TEST_RESULT2, ... ],
      [ TEST_GROUP2_NAME, TEST_RESULT1, TEST_RESULT2, ... ],
      ...
    ];

"TEST_GROUP_NAME" is a string that describes a group of web tests and their results. It is used during the generation of the test report.

"TEST_RESULT" is an HTTP::WebTest::TestResult object.

EXAMPLES

Some examples of plugins are:

HTTP::WebTest::Plugin::Cookies: Plugin that uses both "prepare_request" and "check_response" hooks.
HTTP::WebTest::Plugin::StatusTest: Simple plugin that defines only the "check_response" hook.
HTTP::WebTest::Plugin::DefaultReport: Example of a report plugin. Uses "start_tests", "report_test" and "end_tests" hooks.

COPYRIGHT

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.