Tips for BDD, TDD, and Cucumber

Over the last year or two I have shared a number of useful and interesting posts on BDD (Business Driven Development), TDD (Test Driven Development), and Cucumber (a tool used to run business-readable scenarios against the software being developed).

When I looked back at the amount I had shared, I thought it would make sense to compile them into one article, for those looking to gain an insight into these methodologies and tools.

This introduction explains what TDD and BDD are, the differences between them, and how Cucumber fits in with this, with a quick introduction to Cucumber.

A 3 minute run-down of what BDD is.

This is a more in-depth article on BDD / TDD, with a good example for those new to this.

A further page highlighting the differences between various testing methodologies

The above article (from the creators of Cucumber) talks about Example Mapping. This is a good way to get the conversation started on the business requirements by discussing concrete examples.

Just because we know how to write feature files, it does not necessarily mean we know how to write them properly! This article gives tips on writing succinct and readable feature files.

Examples of what to avoid when writing feature files, and what should have been done.

More detail on anti-patterns in Cucumber, to help you write better feature files.

This article talks about how Cucumber is not specifically a testing framework, but is actually a tool for documenting the system.