Google Tests (unit testing framework) working with Embarcadero C++ clang compiler?

[Roger Cigol 103]

Has anyone got Google Tests (unit testing framework) working with Embarcadero C++ clang compiler? if so, using clang32 or clang64 bit? [or, ideally, both?] I can't find any web documentation that tells me if this is currently possible (Embarcadero 10.4.1) or not. (If there is a helpful URL then I would be grateful if anyone can oblige).

[Roger Cigol 103]

This is now in the Getit package manager list for RAD Studio 10.4.2

[RobinP 2]

Hi Roger, did you get any further with using Google Test in 10.4.2?  We're currently looking for a replacement for DUnit so we can migrate to using the Clang compilers, so we'd be interested in any experience you have to share.

[Roger Cigol 103]

Hi @RobinP, we have been delayed (again) on moving to Clang because we have found there are some problems Embarcadero have yet to resolve re: building / using your own VCL components that are written in C++. We have a set of "in house" VCL components written in C++ that we use in most (virtually all) projects. It seems we can't use Clang32 or Clang64 with "in house" C++ components at the moment. So we are still on "classic" compiler. Frustrating because we really want to use C++17 constructs now. So we are still on DUnit - (which works fine but is a bit limited). We will come back to this posting when we move forward. (We are waiting for 10.5 which will fix this C++ component issue).

[RobinP 2]

Thx @Roger Cigol, looks like you are in a similar place to us.  I'm with you on looking forward to C++17, and not looking forward to migrating 100 DUnit test projects to something else.  I really like the GUI runner in DUnit so would prefer something similar (there do seem to be a couple for GoogleTest that look interesting).

[Stefan Glienke 2006]

Out of interest - and possibly even making sure that TestInsight works with C++ using DUnit (no promise though) - what does not work with DUnit in C++?

[RobinP 2]

DUnit works fine using the classic C++ compiler, but with Clang some tests wouldn't build due to a missing overload of CheckEquals.  I reported it but they said it was a DUnit issue so nobody is going to fix it.

 

https://quality.embarcadero.com/browse/RSP-27695

 

Since DUnit seems to have been a dead project for many years it makes sense to move to something else now as part of our Clang migration.  I know there are spinoffs but I think DUnitX is now deprecated or will not be supported by Embarcadero, and I'm not sure how far DUnit2 got or if it works with C++ and Clang.

[Stefan Glienke 2006]

DUnit is not actively being maintained, true. But I am planning to keep on using it - it achieved a nice balance between being flexible enough but at the same time very simple and not overengineered, ymmv.

I don't care what some guy in that issue says - they have been doing modifications to DUnit themselfes for ages and suddenly its a DUnit issue they cannot/don't want to fix? How ridiculous tbh.

 

I have my opinion about DUnitX - but it's certainly not deprecated but Vincent does not care for adding C++ support afaik.

 

I was in fact looking into dusting off DUnit, removing old cruft like the CLR stuff and applying some optimizations such as making parameters const, reducing unnecessary overhead in Check methods and so on (doing so improves the overall runtime of my tests by like 10% simply because the CheckSomething methods are faster!) while doing that I could look into making it work with C++

[RobinP 2]

I agree with all you say about DUnit. I had a quick look into fixing it myself but since we are currently a pure C++ shop (don't even have Delphi installed) I thought it was too much of a learning curve and would probably be easier just to move to a more actively maintained framework, hence my interest in GoogleTest.  I have a feeling there were more issues with DUnit and Clang but can't remember exactly what.

[Fr0sT.Brutal 900]

What's so special in "testing framework"? It must run tests, have convenient way of adding tests, maybe pretty GUI and, more important, file output to most used formats. Talking about checking methods, AreEqual, AreNotEqual and WillRaise are enough. So what's the demand?

[Stefan Glienke 2006]

54 minutes ago, Fr0sT.Brutal said:

What's so special in "testing framework"? It must run tests, have convenient way of adding tests, maybe pretty GUI and, more important, file output to most used formats. Talking about checking methods, AreEqual, AreNotEqual and WillRaise are enough. So what's the demand?

The demand is being able to compile the existing framework 😉

[Vincent Parrett 750]

10 hours ago, RobinP said:

I know there are spinoffs but I think DUnitX is now deprecated or will not be supported by Embarcadero

Ok, that's news to me (DUnitX author). 😉

[Vincent Parrett 750]

10 hours ago, Stefan Glienke said:

I have my opinion about DUnitX - but it's certainly not deprecated but Vincent does not care for adding C++ support afaik.

It's not that I don't care for it, I just don't have the time (or skills for it). Happy to look at contributions to achieve this. I do know there are some issues with constructor overloads that would need to be addressed. 

[Fr0sT.Brutal 900]

16 hours ago, Stefan Glienke said:

The demand is being able to compile the existing framework 😉

Is there a trouble with DUnitX? CB consumes Delphi code AFAIK.

[Dalija Prasnikar 1396]

4 minutes ago, Fr0sT.Brutal said:

Is there a trouble with DUnitX? CB consumes Delphi code AFAIK.

CB can use most of the Delphi code, but not all.

[Fr0sT.Brutal 900]

1 minute ago, Dalija Prasnikar said:

CB can use most of the Delphi code, but not all.

Anyway I guess adopting DUnitX would be much easier than trying to glue with completely different platform

[RobinP 2]

Ok seems to be my mistake, DUnitX is clearly still used for Delphi, but the 10.4 wiki clearly states that it does not work with C++ Builder, and they even suggest using GoogleTest: http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/Sydney/en/DUnitX_Overview

 

So if I want to migrate to the Clang compilers this leaves 3 options:

1. Hope somebody updates DUnit or DUnitX to work with Clang (32 and 64 bit).  I could maybe do some testing for this but can't put much time into it.

2. Move to another already existing C++ framework such as GoogleTest.

3. Write my own home brew test framework.

 

At the moment I don't really have any idea which would be easier. 

[Stefan Glienke 2006]

In 1. you write that you don't have much time. Do you think that 2. or 3. would require less time?

[RobinP 2]

@Stefan Glienke I really don't know, I'll have to start trying things out, but this won't be for a month or two yet.

[Fr0sT.Brutal 900]

I personally use attributes only to mark Setup/Teardown methods, rarely to ignore some parts. The former could be achieved by adding empty virtual methods to TTestSuite

[Roger Cigol 103]

I'm working on a new PostgreSQL project. This requires a Win 64 bit (VCL) C++ FireDAC application. This forces me to ditch DUnit (some more experiments with some starting code suggest DUnit tests compile ok but when you come to run them under clang64 they don't appear in the test tree (the main test files do appear, but the individual tests are missing) and so the green arrow "run tests" is greyed. Out.

 

Using 10.4.2 I used the gettit package manager to install GoogleTests - this downloaded without errors. It put it all in somewhere I might not have chosen (but since it's all source code I can probably moved this)

 

However I have got the sample test sample8_unittest.exe that is one of the samples that comes as part of the getit install to compile and run using clang32 and clang64. 

 

But it doesn't have the nice GUI front end that DUnit tests have. 

 

Next: Does anyone know of a GUI front end that is compatible with Embarcadero C++ Builder?

 

Next (for me) : I need to see if I can get some unit tests of my 64 bit app to run.......

[Stefan Glienke 2006]

TestInsight is test framework agnostic so it could work with GoogleTests - apart from direct support of the different run options from the TestInsight window itself you could probably implement that support yourself just from studying the sources that ship with TestInsight.

[Roger Cigol 103]

I have now got googletest framework up and running with a Windows VCL clang64 project.

I've posted two blogs about this here:

https://cigolblog.wordpress.com/2021/07/16/tips-for-using-googletests-with-embarcadero-clang64-for-windows-vcl-projects/

 

[Roger Cigol 103]

A word of warning: there seems to be some issues with GooglTest framework and C++ in RAD Studio 11.0. I am working on this and will post news as and when it is available !

[Roger Cigol 103]

Great news : Google Tests all looks good for 11.1.

I've blogged about how to get it up and running...

https://cigolblog.wordpress.com/2022/03/17/using-googletests-with-embarcadero-clang64-for-windows-vcl-projects-c-builder-11-1/

I will add a further blog in the next few days about how I like to use it for testing my Clang64bit projects.