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Spek vs Behat comparison of testing frameworks
What are the differences between Spek and Behat?

Spek

https://www.spekframework.org/

Behat

https://docs.behat.org/en/latest/
Programming language

Kotlin

PHP

Category

Acceptance Testing, Unit Testing

Functional/Acceptance Testing

General info

Spek is a specification framework for Kotlin

Spek is a Kotlin-based Specification Testing framework for the JVM. It works as a JUnit 5 Test Engine meaning that we can easily plug it into any project that already uses JUnit 5 to run alongside any other tests that we might have.

Behat is an open source Behavior-Driven Development framework for PHP.

Behat uses the StoryBDD subtype of behaviour-driven development (the other subtype is SpecBDD); This means the tests we write with Behat look rather like stories than code. It is inspired by Ruby's Cucumber
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

Yes you can test front-end behaviour by writing specifications to test front-end functionality. Developers can also write unit tests for individual front-end components.

Yes

To enable Behat to test a website, you need to add Mink and a browser emulator (selenium maybe, though slow) to the mix. Mink methods are the connector between Behat and an extensive list of available drivers, and they provide a consistent testing API.
Server-side
Allows testing the bahovior of a server-side code

Yes

You can test back-end behaviour and componets by writing specifications to test back-end functionality and unit tests for individual back-end components

Yes

Behat can be used for Data Integrity Testing to verify that database operations are functioning properly
Fixtures
Allows defining a fixed, specific states of data (fixtures) that are test-local. This ensures specific environment for a single test

Yes

Fixtures are available in spek through functions suchas beforeEachTest() and afterEachTest()

Yes

One can use the 'Doctrinefixturesbundle' to create the required fixture loaders and load them in our Behat scenarios when required, using the 'BeforeScenario' hook.
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

spek has group fixtures available through the beforeGroup() and afterGroup() functions

Yes

Behat allows for group fixtures
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

By use of third party libraries like moodle-behat-generators
Licence
Licence type governing the use and redistribution of the software

Modified BSD License

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

You can use the third party library mockito-kotlin

By using third party libraries like Mock and Prophecy
Grouping
Allows organizing tests in groups

Yes

Tests are written using nested lambdas, each scope (level) can either be a group or a test

Yes

You can use tags to group features and scenarios together, independent of your file and directory structure
Other
Other useful information about the testing framework