An article posted on Visual Studio Magazine discusses getting started test-driving ASP.Net projects. The author, Peter Vogel, mentions some common replies he gets when introducing TDD to uninitiated programmers. These questions are common across all software engineering domains. I’ve received similar questions, and asked these same questions when I started.
An important point Vogel makes is that TDD doesn’t replace your current (usually manual) methods of testing; TDD complements your current process, making it more reliable and faster.
I think that, for most developers, the biggest issue is that they have a working UI that they’ve been using for testing. That form of testing – as inefficient as it is compared to using the TDD environment – has become a habit and, as a result, easier to keep doing than to change.
TDD isn’t a substitute for human inspection. It is a tool that lightens the testing burden of the developer. Tests also improve product reliability when incorporated into Regression Testing. This also saves time for Quality Assurance Testers.
In fact, I’d suggest that whatever testing you’re doing now is always going to be easier with TDD than by navigating through your code using a browser: right click, select Run Tests, and you have your result.
You can read the full article here
