Databases and the CI server
- by mlk
I have a CI server (Hudson) which merrily builds, runs unit tests and deploys to the development environment but I'd now like to get it running the integration tests.
The integration tests will hit a database and that database will be consistently being changed to contain the data relevant to the test in question. This however leads to a problem - how do I make sure the database is not being splatted with data for one test and then that data being override by a second project before the first set of tests complete?
I am current using the "hope" method, which is not working out too badly at the moment, but mostly due to the fact that we only have a small number of integration tests set up on CI.
As I see it I have the following options:
Test-local (in memory) databases I'm not sure if any in-memory databases handle all the scaryness of Oracles triggers and packages etc, and anything less I don't feel would be a worth while test.
CI Executor-local databasesA fair amount of work would be needed to set this up and keep 'em up to date, but defiantly an option (most of the work is already done to keep the current CI database up-to-date).
Single "integration test" executorLikely the easiest to implement, but would mean the integration tests could fall quite far behind.
Locking the database (or set of tables)
I'm sure I've missed some ways (please add them). How do you run database-based integration tests on the CI server? What issues have you had and what method do you recommend? (Note: While I use Hudson, I'm happy to accept answers for any CI server, the ideas I'm sure will be portable, even if the details are not).
Cheers,
Mlk
