Apache::test(3)User Contributed Perl DocumentationApache::test(3)NAMEApache::test - Facilitates testing of Apache::* modules
SYNOPSIS
# In Makefile.PL
use Apache::test;
my %params = Apache::test->get_test_params();
Apache::test->write_httpd_conf(%params, include => $more_directives);
*MY::test = sub { Apache::test->MM_test(%params) };
# In t/*.t script (or test.pl)
use Apache::test qw(skip_test have_httpd);
skip_test unless have_httpd;
(Some more methods of Doug's that I haven't reviewed or documented yet)
DESCRIPTION
This module helps authors of Apache::* modules write test
suites that can query an actual running Apache server with
mod_perl and their modules loaded into it. Its function
ality is generally separated into methods that go in a
Makefile.PL to configure, start, and stop the server, and
methods that go in one of the test scripts to make HTTP
queries and manage the results.
METHODSget_test_params()
This will ask the user a few questions about where the
httpd binary is, and what user/group/port should be used
when running the server. It will return a hash of the
information it discovers. This hash is suitable for pass
ing to the "write_httpd_conf()" method.
write_httpd_conf(%params)
This will write a basic "httpd.conf" file suitable for
starting a HTTP server during the 'make test' stage. A
hash of key/value pairs that affect the written file can
be passed as arguments. The following keys are recog
nized:
conf_file
The path to the file that will be created. Default is
't/httpd.conf'.
port
The port that the Apache server will listen on.
user
The user that the Apache server will run as.
group
The group that the Apache server will run as.
include
Any additional text you want added at the end of the
config file. Typically you'll have some "PerlModule"
and "Perl*Handler" directives to pass control to the
module you're testing. The "blib/" directories will
be added to the "@INC" path when searching for mod
ules, so that's nice.
MM_test(%params)
This method helps write a Makefile that supports running a
web server during the 'make test' stage. When you execute
'make test', 'make' will run 'make start_httpd', 'make
run_tests', and 'make kill_httpd' in sequence. You can
also run these commands independently if you want.
Pass the hash of parameters returned by
"get_test_params()" as an argument to "MM_test()".
To patch into the ExtUtils::MakeMaker wizardry (voodoo?),
typically you'll do the following in your Makefile.PL:
*MY::test = sub { Apache::test->MM_test(%params) };
fetch
Apache::test->fetch($request);
Apache::test->fetch($user_agent, $request);
Call this method in a test script in order to fetch a page
from the running web server. If you pass two arguments,
the first should be an LWP::UserAgent object, and the sec
ond should specify the request to make of the server. If
you only pass one argument, it specifies the request to
make.
The request can be specified either by a simple string
indicating the URI to fetch, or by a hash reference, which
gives you more control over the request. The following
keys are recognized in the hash:
uri
The URI to fetch from the server. If the URI does not
begin with "http", we prepend "http://localhost:$PORT"
so that we make requests of the test server.
method
The request method to use. Default is 'GET'.
content
The request content body. Typically used to simulate
HTML fill-out form submission for POST requests.
Default is null.
headers
A hash of headers you want sent with the request. You
might use this to send cookies or provide some appli
cation-specific header.
If you don't provide a 'headers' parameter and you set the
'method' to 'POST', then we assume that you're trying to
simulate HTML form submission and we add a 'Content_Type'
header with a value of 'application/x-www-form-urlen
coded'.
In a scalar context, fetch() returns the content of the
web server's response. In a list context, fetch() returns
the content and the HTTP::Response object itself. This
can be handy if you need to check the response headers, or
the HTTP return code, or whatever.
static_modules
Example: $mods = Apache::test->static_modules('/path/to/httpd');
This method returns a hashref whose keys are all the mod
ules statically compiled into the given httpd binary. The
corresponding values are all 1.
EXAMPLES
No good examples yet. Example submissions are welcome.
In the meantime, see http://forum.swarthmore.edu/~ken/mod
ules/Apache-AuthCookie/ , which I'm retrofitting to use
Apache::test.
TO DO
The MM_test method doesn't try to be very smart, it just
writes the text that seems to work in my configuration. I
am morally against using the 'make' command for installing
Perl modules (though of course I do it anyway), so I
haven't looked into this very much. Send bug reports or
better (patches).
I've got lots of code in my Apache::AuthCookie module
(etc.) that assists in actually making the queries of the
running server. I plan to add that to this module, but
first I need to compare what's already here that does the
same stuff.
KUDOS
To Doug MacEachern for writing the first version of this
module.
To caelum@debian.org (Rafael Kitover) for contributing the
code to parse existing httpd.conf files for --enable-
shared=max and DSOs.
CAVEATS
Except for making sure that the mod_perl distribution
itself can run 'make test' okay, I haven't tried very hard
to keep compatibility with older versions of this module.
In particular MM_test() has changed and probably isn't
usable in the old ways, since some of its assumptions are
gone. But none of this was ever documented, and MM_test()
doesn't seem to actually be used anywhere in the mod_perl
disribution, so I don't feel so bad about it.
AUTHOR
Doug MacEachern (original version)
Ken Williams (latest changes and this documentation)
2002-05-23 mod_perl-1.27 Apache::test(3)