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Needle vs Espec comparison of testing frameworks
What are the differences between Needle and Espec?

Needle

http://needle.spree.de/

Espec

https://github.com/antonmi/espec
Programming language

Java

Elixir

Category

Unit Testing

Unit Testing

General info

Needle is a lightweight framework for testing Java EE components outside of the container in isolation

Needle reduces the test setup code by analysing dependencies and has automatic injection of mock objects by default. Therefore It will maximize the speed of development as well as the execution of unit tests

BDD driven testing framework for Elixir

It is a testing framework written from scratch which is inspired by RSpec and the main idea is to close to its perfect DSL (Domain Specific Language)
xUnit
Set of frameworks originating from SUnit (Smalltalk's testing framework). They share similar structure and functionality.

No

No

Client-side
Allows testing code execution on the client, such as a web browser

Yes

You can test front-end components and functionality by testing individual front-end classes and functions

Yes

Front-end components can be tested; there is also espec_phoenix for the Phoenix web framework
Server-side
Allows testing the bahovior of a server-side code

Yes

You can test back-end components and functionality.one of needles features is database testing via a JPA (Java Persistence API) like hibernate

Yes

databases and server behaviour can be tested using Espec
Fixtures
Allows defining a fixed, specific states of data (fixtures) that are test-local. This ensures specific environment for a single test

Yes

It has setUp() and tearDown() functions which are mostly used to execute database operations

N/A

Group fixtures
Allows defining a fixed, specific states of data for a group of tests (group-fixtures). This ensures specific environment for a given group of tests.

Yes

The setUp() and tearDown functions can be used to define an environment for a group of tests

N/A

Generators
Supports data generators for tests. Data generators generate input data for test. The test is then run for each input data produced in this way.

N/A

N/A

Licence
Licence type governing the use and redistribution of the software

GNU Lesser General Public License v2.1

MIT License

Mocks
Mocks are objects that simulate the behavior of real objects. Using mocks allows testing some part of the code in isolation (with other parts mocked when needed)

Yes

One of needle's features is automatic injection of mock objects, it supports EasyMock and Mockito out of the box

Yes

It has a Built-in mocking functionality on top of Erlang 'meck' library
Grouping
Allows organizing tests in groups

N/A

Yes

By use of context blocksand tags functions
Other
Other useful information about the testing framework