Go Testing

What it does

This skill assists with Go testing, debugging, and quality assurance workflows. It provides guidance on best practices for writing effective and diagnosable Go tests, covering topics from error reporting to comparison techniques and test structure. The skill emphasizes clear failure messages and discourages the use of assertion libraries in favor of direct comparisons using cmp.Diff.

When to use it

• When you need help structuring Go tests for clarity and maintainability.
• When writing table-driven tests with shared logic across multiple cases.
• When debugging failing Go tests and needing to understand the root cause quickly.
• To ensure your test failures provide sufficient information (function name, inputs, actual vs expected values).

Key capabilities

• Guidance on using t.Error versus t.Fatal for reporting test failures.
• Best practices for creating informative failure messages including function names and input values.
• Recommendations for comparing data structures (structs, slices, maps, protobufs) using cmp.Diff.
• Advice on structuring table-driven tests and when to use them appropriately.
• Information about subtests for filtering, parallel execution, and naming.

Example prompts

• "How should I format a test failure message in Go?"
• "What's the best way to compare two structs in my Go test?"
• "Should I use t.Error or t.Fatal for this failing test case?"

Tips & gotchas

• Always include function names and inputs in your failure messages for easy debugging.
• Avoid using assertion libraries; utilize cmp.Diff for complex comparisons.
• Refer to the referenced documents (TEST-HELPERS.md, TABLE-DRIVEN-TESTS.md) for more detailed information on specific testing techniques.