Functional testing with the TYPO3 testing framework

Simple Example

At the time of this writing, TYPO3 Core contains more than 2600 functional tests, so there are plenty of test files to look at to learn about writing functional tests. Do not hesitate looking around, there is plenty to discover.

As a starter, let's have a look at a basic scenario from the styleguide example again:

<?php

namespace TYPO3\CMS\Styleguide\Tests\Functional\TcaDataGenerator;

use PHPUnit\Framework\Attributes\Test;
use TYPO3\TestingFramework\Core\Functional\FunctionalTestCase;

class GeneratorTest extends FunctionalTestCase
{
    /**
     * Have styleguide loaded
     */
    protected array $testExtensionsToLoad = [
        'typo3conf/ext/styleguide',
    ];

    #[Test]
    public function generatorCreatesBasicRecord(): void
    {
        //...
    }
}

That's the basic setup needed for a functional test: Extend FunctionalTestCase, declare extension styleguide should be loaded and have a first test.

Extending setUp

Note setUp() is not overridden in this case. If you override it, remember to always call parent::setUp() before doing own stuff. An example can be found in \TYPO3\CMS\Backend\Tests\Functional\Domain\Repository\Localization\LocalizationRepositoryTest:

<?php

declare(strict_types=1);

namespace TYPO3\CMS\Backend\Tests\Functional\Domain\Repository\Localization;

use TYPO3\CMS\Backend\Domain\Repository\Localization\LocalizationRepository;
use TYPO3\CMS\Core\Core\Bootstrap;
use TYPO3\TestingFramework\Core\Functional\FunctionalTestCase;

/**
 * Test case
 */
class LocalizationRepositoryTest extends FunctionalTestCase
{
    /**
     * @var LocalizationRepository
     */
    protected $subject;

    /**
     * Sets up this test case.
     */
    protected function setUp(): void
    {
        parent::setUp();

        $this->importCSVDataSet(__DIR__ . '/Fixtures/be_users.csv');
        $this->setUpBackendUser(1);
        Bootstrap::initializeLanguageObject();

        $this->importCSVDataSet(ORIGINAL_ROOT . 'typo3/sysext/backend/Tests/Functional/Domain/Repository/Localization/Fixtures/DefaultPagesAndContent.csv');

        $this->subject = new LocalizationRepository();
    }

    // ...
}

The above example overrides setUp() to first call parent::setUp(). This is critically important to do, if not done the entire test instance set up is not triggered. After calling parent, various things needed by all tests of this scenario are added: A database fixture is loaded, a backend user is added, the language object is initialized and an instance of the system under test is parked as $this->subject within the class.

Loaded extensions

The FunctionalTestCase has a couple of defaults and properties to specify the set of loaded extensions of a test case: First, there is a set of default Core extensions that are always loaded. Those should be require or at least require-dev dependencies in a composer.json file, too: core, backend, frontend, extbase and install.

Apart from that default list, it is possible to load additional Core extensions: An extension that wants to test if it works well together with workspaces, would for example specify the workspaces extension as additional to-load extension:

<?php

namespace TYPO3\CMS\Styleguide\Tests\Functional\TcaDataGenerator;

use PHPUnit\Framework\Attributes\Test;
use TYPO3\TestingFramework\Core\Functional\FunctionalTestCase;

class GeneratorTest extends FunctionalTestCase
{
    /**
     * Have styleguide loaded
     */
    protected array $testExtensionsToLoad = [
        'typo3conf/ext/styleguide',
    ];

    #[Test]
    public function generatorCreatesBasicRecord(): void
    {
        //...
    }
}

Furthermore, third party extensions and fixture extensions can be loaded for any given test case:

<?php

namespace TYPO3\CMS\Styleguide\Tests\Functional\TcaDataGenerator;

use PHPUnit\Framework\Attributes\Test;
use TYPO3\TestingFramework\Core\Functional\FunctionalTestCase;

class GeneratorTest extends FunctionalTestCase
{
    /**
     * Have styleguide loaded
     */
    protected array $testExtensionsToLoad = [
        'typo3conf/ext/styleguide',
    ];

    #[Test]
    public function generatorCreatesBasicRecord(): void
    {
        //...
    }
}

In this case the fictional extension some_extension comes with an own fixture extension that should be loaded, and another base_extension should be loaded. These extensions will be linked into typo3conf/ext of the test case instance.

The functional test bootstrap links all extensions to either typo3/sysext for Core extensions or typo3conf/ext for third party extensions, creates a PackageStates.php and then uses the database schema analyzer to create all database tables specified in the ext_tables.sql files.

Database fixtures

To populate the test database tables with rows to prepare any given scenario, the helper method $this->importCSVDataSet() can be used. Note it is not possible to inject a fully prepared database, for instance it is not possible to provide a full .sqlite database and work on this in the test case. Instead, database rows should be provided as .csv files to be loaded into the database using $this->importCSVDataSet(). An example file could look like this:

"pages"
,"uid","pid","sorting","deleted","t3_origuid","title"
,1,0,256,0,0,"Connected mode"

"tt_content"
,"uid","pid","sorting","deleted","sys_language_uid","l18n_parent","l10n_source","t3_origuid","header"
,297,1,256,0,0,0,0,0,"Regular Element #1"

This file defines one row for the pages table and one tt_content row. So one .csv file can contain rows of multiple tables.

In general, the methods need the absolute path to the fixture file to load them. However some keywords are allowed:

<?php

namespace TYPO3\CMS\Styleguide\Tests\Functional\TcaDataGenerator;

use PHPUnit\Framework\Attributes\Test;
use TYPO3\TestingFramework\Core\Functional\FunctionalTestCase;

class GeneratorTest extends FunctionalTestCase
{
    /**
     * Have styleguide loaded
     */
    protected array $testExtensionsToLoad = [
        'typo3conf/ext/styleguide',
    ];

    #[Test]
    public function generatorCreatesBasicRecord(): void
    {
        //...
    }
}

Asserting database

A test that triggered some data munging in the database probably wants to test if the final state of some rows in the database is as expected after the job is done. The helper method assertCSVDataSet() helps to do that. As in the .csv example above, it needs the absolute path to some CSV file that can contain rows of multiple tables. The methods will then look up the according rows in the database and compare their values with the fields provided in the CSV files. If they are not identical, the test will fail and output a table which field values did not match.

Loading files

If the system under test works on files, those can be provided by the test setup, too. As example, one may want to check if an image has been properly sized down. The image to work on can be linked into the test instance:

<?php

namespace TYPO3\CMS\Styleguide\Tests\Functional\TcaDataGenerator;

use PHPUnit\Framework\Attributes\Test;
use TYPO3\TestingFramework\Core\Functional\FunctionalTestCase;

class GeneratorTest extends FunctionalTestCase
{
    /**
     * Have styleguide loaded
     */
    protected array $testExtensionsToLoad = [
        'typo3conf/ext/styleguide',
    ];

    #[Test]
    public function generatorCreatesBasicRecord(): void
    {
        //...
    }
}

It is also possible to copy the files to the test instance instead of only linking it using $pathsToProvideInTestInstance.

Setting TYPO3_CONF_VARS

A default config/system/settings.php file of the instance is created by the default setUp(). It contains the database credentials and everything else to end up with a working TYPO3 instance.

If extensions need additional settings in config/system/settings.php, the property $configurationToUseInTestInstance can be used to specify these:

<?php

declare(strict_types=1);

namespace MyVendor\MyExtension\Tests\Functional;

use PHPUnit\Framework\Attributes\Test;
use Symfony\Component\Mailer\Transport\NullTransport;
use TYPO3\TestingFramework\Core\Functional\FunctionalTestCase;

class SomeTest extends FunctionalTestCase
{
    protected array $configurationToUseInTestInstance = [
        'MAIL' => [
            'transport' => NullTransport::class,
        ],
    ];

    #[Test]
    public function something(): void
    {
        //...
    }
}

Frontend tests

To prepare a frontend test, the system can be instructed to load a set of .typoscript files for a working frontend:

<?php

declare(strict_types=1);

namespace MyVendor\MyExtension\Tests\Functional;

use PHPUnit\Framework\Attributes\Test;
use TYPO3\TestingFramework\Core\Functional\FunctionalTestCase;

class SomeTest extends FunctionalTestCase
{
    #[Test]
    public function somethingWithWorkspaces(): void
    {
        $this->setUpFrontendRootPage(
            1,
            ['EXT:fluid_test/Configuration/TypoScript/Basic.typoscript'],
        );
    }
}

This instructs the system to load the Basic.typoscript as TypoScript file for the frontend page with uid 1.

A frontend request can be executed calling $this->executeFrontendRequest(). It will return a Response object to be further worked on, for instance it is possible to verify if the body ->getBody() contains some string.