Roadmap

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Planned features for future releases - order changes constantly... Also look through the issues.

For 2.5:

• https://github.com/doctest/doctest/issues/208
• reporters:
  • ability to redirect the stdout/stderr from test cases and capture it - like Catch does it
  • xUnit/TeamCity reporter
  • compact reporter
• matchers - should investigate what they are - look at google test/mock and Catch (also predicates and boost test)
• header with extensions
  • demangling with the use of the cxxabi header
  • stringification of types from std, also enums with the help of traits as discussed in #121
  • esoteric reporters
• convolution support for the assertion macros (with a predicate)
• Value-Parameterized test cases
• generators? - look at Catch - and investigate what they are (also SUBCASEs can be while() loops instead of if() statements! that might be useful...)
• look at property based testing
  • rapidcheck
  • autocheck
  • CppQuickCheck
• proper conan package - https://github.com/doctest/doctest/issues/103
• IDE integration
  • https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/vcblog/2017/05/10/unit-testing-and-the-future-announcing-the-test-adapter-for-google-test/
  • https://www.reddit.com/r/cpp/comments/65c0f1/run_cpp_unit_tests_from_xcode_and_visual_studio/
  • https://github.com/k-brac/CUTI
  • https://github.com/csoltenborn/GoogleTestAdapter
  • MSTest
    • http://accu.org/index.php/journals/1851
    • https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh270865.aspx
    • https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh598953.aspx
    • https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/vcblog/2017/04/19/cpp-testing-in-visual-studio/
    • https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh419385.aspx
  • XCode - https://github.com/catchorg/Catch2/pull/454
  • CLion
    • https://www.jetbrains.com/clion/features/unit-testing.html
    • https://blog.jetbrains.com/clion/2017/03/clion-2017-1-released/#catch

For 2.6:

• log levels - like in boost test
• running tests a few times
• test execution in separate processes - fork() for UNIX and this for Windows
• killing a test that exceeds a time limit (will perhaps require threading or processes)
• symbolizer - for a stack trace - when an assertion fails - and it's in a user function with some deep callstack away from the current test case - how to know the exact code path that lead to the failing assert
• ability to make the framework not capture unexpected exceptions - as requested here
• add Approx ability to compare with absolute epsilon - Catch PR
• ability to customize the colors in the console output (may also use styles - based on this or this)
• implement breaking into the debugger under linux - see here and here
• better testing of the library
  • unit test the String class
  • should unit test internals - currently even if a bug is caught by different output it's very difficult to track the reason
  • should test stuff that should not compile
    • https://github.com/ldionne/dyno/blob/master/cmake/CompileFailTest.cmake
    • see slide 38 here - https://github.com/boostcon/cppnow_presentations_2017/blob/master/05-19-2017_friday/effective_cmake__daniel_pfeifer__cppnow_05-19-2017.pdf
  • should test crash handling
  • should test more config options
  • don't cheat for maxing out code coverage (see coverage_maxout.cpp)
  • should test C++11 stuff - perhaps inspect the CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS for -std=c++11 on the CI and add more targets/tests
  • test tricky stuff like expressions with commas in asserts

For 3.0:

• use modules - use std::string and whatever else comes from the standard - no more hand rolled traits and classes
• minimize the use of the preprocessor
• remove backwards-compatible macros for the fast asserts

Things that are being considered but not part of the roadmap yet:

• add ability to print a diff for strings/values instead of the whole 2 versions (gtest does that)
• add LIKELY & friends for the conditions of asserts - look at BOOST_LIKELY, ppk_assert, foonathan/debug_assert, etc
• ability for users to register their own command line options and access them later on
• fix this: https://github.com/catchorg/Catch2/issues/1292
• FakeIt mocking integration - like catch (also checkout this)
• look into https://github.com/cpp-testing/GUnit - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVrZjT5lW5o
• consider the following 2 properties for the MSVC static code analyzer: EnableCppCoreCheck, EnableExperimentalCppCoreCheck
• rpm package? like this: https://github.com/vietjtnguyen/argagg/blob/master/packaging/rpm/argagg.spec
• get the current test case/section path - https://github.com/catchorg/Catch2/issues/522
• when no assertion is encountered in a test case it should fail - and should also add a SUCCEED() call
• failure reporting should print out previous SECTIONs for data-driven testing - as requested here
• Bitwise() class that has overloaded operators for comparison - to be used to check objects bitwise against each other
• detect floating point exceptions
• checkpoint/passpoint - like in boost test (also make all assert/subcase/logging macros to act as passpoints and print the last one on crashes or exceptions)
• queries for the current test case - name (and probably decorators)
• support for LibIdentify
• add CHECKED_IF & friends: https://github.com/catchorg/Catch2/issues/1278
• support for running tests in parallel in multiple threads
• death tests - as in google test
• config options
  • test case name uniqueness - reject the ones with identical names
• command line options
  • ability to specify ASC/DESC for the order option
  • global timeout option (per test or per entire session?)
  • command line error handling/reporting
  • option to not print context info when the --success option is used
  • ability for the user to extend the command line - as requested here
  • option to list files in which there are test cases who match the current filters
  • option for filters to switch from "match any" to "match all" mode
  • option to list test suites and test cases in a tree view
  • add a "wait key" option (before and after tests) - as requested here
• decorators for test cases and test suites- like in boost test
  • depends_on
  • precondition
  • fixture
  • label (tag) - with the ability to have multiple labels (tags) for a test case and also the ability to list them
  • run X times (should also multiply with (or just override) the global test run times)
  • throw an exception when incompatible decorators are given in the same list of decorators - like may_fail and should_fail
• setup / teardown support
  • global setup / teardown - can be currently achieved by providing a custom main function
  • per test suite (block? only? and not all blocks of the same test suite?)
  • as decorators
  • see how it's done in boost test - with the fixture decorator
  • perhaps for fixtures in addition to the constructor / destructor - since throwing in the destructor might terminate the program
  • or just ignore all of this this - it would require globals or classes and inheritance - and we already have subcases
• doctest in a GUI environment? with no console? APIs for attaching a console? querying if there is one? investigate...
• runtime performance
  • look at this: https://github.com/catchorg/Catch2/issues/1086
  • startup - the set holding all registered tests should use a specialized allocator to minimize program startup time
  • optimize the mutex lock:
    • http://preshing.com/20111124/always-use-a-lightweight-mutex/
    • http://preshing.com/20120226/roll-your-own-lightweight-mutex/
• ability to provide a temp folder that is cleared between each test case
• make the _MESSAGE assert macros work with variadic arguments - and maybe write the ones for binary/unary asserts as well
• move from operator "<<" to "<=" for capturing the left operand when decomposing binary expressions with templates
• think about silencing warnings about unused variables when DOCTEST_CONFIG_DISABLE is used - see commit 6b61e8aa3818c5ea100cedc1bb48a60ea10df6e8 or issue #61
  • also this: (void)(true ? (void)0 : ((void)(expression)))
• think about optionally using <typeinfo> and libcxxabi for demangling so users don't have to use TYPE_TO_STRING()
• handle more complex expressions - CHECK(foo() == 1 || bar() == 2);
• add [[noreturn]] to MessageBuilder::react() - and actually make a separate function (react2) for the FAIL() case
• think about using a string view of some sorts
• benchmark against google test and boost test

Things that are very unlikely to enter the roadmap:

• rethink static code analysis suppressions - users shouldn't have to use the same flags for code which uses doctest macros/types
• templated fixture test cases
• test with missed warning flags for GCC
  • https://github.com/Barro/compiler-warnings
  • https://stackoverflow.com/a/34971392/3162383
• utf8 / unicode ???
  • https://github.com/catchorg/Catch2/pull/903
• handle wchar strings???
• hierarchical test suites - using a stack for the pushed ones
• ability to specify the width of the terminal in terms of characters (for example 60 - less than 80 - the default)
• ability to re-run only newly compiled tests based on time stamps using __DATE__ and __TIME__ - stored in some file
• add underscores to all preprocessor identifiers not intended for use by the user
• put everything from the detail namespace also in a nested anonymous namespace to make them with internal linkage
• ability to put everything from doctest into an anonymous namespace - to allow the use of multiple different versions of doctest within the same binary (executable/dll) - like the stb libraries can

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