NAME Test::System - Test suite oriented for testing system administration tasks SYNOPSIS use Test::System; my $suite = Test::System->new( format => 'consoletable', nodes => 'example.com', test_groups => '~/code/my/system/tests.yaml' ); $hung->runtests; DESCRIPTION Loads and runs a set of tests for verifying a system administration task before a possible incident or after a task that has been done. Tests can be run as perl scripts and actually in any format *TAP::Harness* supports. Attributes The module offers a list of attributes that some only have read only access and others allow write access. test_groups YAML filename of where a list of available tests are. This is not required but can be useful if you want to group tests (like *hardware.yaml*, *net.yaml*, etc). Comes also handy when user does not provide a list of tests to execute, so all the tests listed in this file are executed. An example of a YAML file: ping: description: Test the ping and do foo and make bar code: test/foo.pl cpu: description: Test the CPU of nodes code: test/cpu.pl available_tests Is a read only attribute that contains a list of all available tests found in the YAML file provided by "test_groups". nodes Is an attribute that can be represented as a string (like a hostname) or as a list (where each item will be a node/hostname). This attribute has write access and is where the tests are going to be executed to. Another way of setting this value is when "runtests()" is called a test plan (in the form of a YAML file) can be provided and it can contain the list of nodes to use. format A write access string that has the format of how the tests should be presented, please refer to the modules available under Test::System::Output or in your custom factory ("custom_factory" attribute) class if this is the case. available_formats A list of available formats, read only. custom_factory If you want to use your own Factory for creating your output you can set this to your class name (NOT the object). parameters An attribute with write access permission. This attribute will transform all the items of this hash to environment variables. The use of this attribute is very handy if you want to provide some additional data for your tests and since the tests are run in separate forks with Test::Harness then the only possible way to keep them is to make them available through the environment (%ENV hash). Please be warned that only scalars are stored in environment variables, those that are an array will be converted to CSV values while the rest of the data types will be lost. In your tests if you want to use any of these parameters they will be available through the environment variables with a prefix of: "TEST_SYSTEM_". Methods runtests( @tests , %options ) It will run a group of given test cases, however if no list is given or is empty then all the available cases will be run. The %options is a hash of options that will be passed to the *TAP::Harness* object, some useful parameters are: * verbosity By default we mute everything with -9. * color If you want the output (in console) to have color * formatter Although we use Test::System::Output::Factory to offer a set of formatters you can provide your own formatter object. See "available_formats". * jobs If you have many tests you probably want to increment this value (that defaults to 1) so other tests can be run at the same time. prepare_environment() Prepares the environment by settings the needed environment values so they can be used later by the tests clean_environment () Cleans/deletes all the environment variables that match "TEST_SYSTEM_*" get_tests_from_test_plan($yaml_file, $do_not_fill_parameters, $do_not_fill_nodes) Reads the given tests yaml file ($yaml_file). This YAML file should have at least a list of tests (in the form of a hash) and optionally can also have parameters the tests should contain. Although this method is used mostly internally there's the option to call it as any other method *Test::System* offers. By default it will fill the parameters of your *Test::System* instance but by passing $do_not_fill_parameters (second parameter) as true or something that Perl understands as true then it will skip the part. This should be presented as a hash in YAML syntax. The above apply also to $do_not_fill_nodes (third parameter). This should be presented as an array in YAML syntax. Once the file is read an array with all the tests will be returned. An example of a YAML test plan file can be found inside the "examples" directory or: tests: - ping - cpu - memory parameters: foo: bar bar: zoo nodes: - pablo.com.mx - example.com AUTHOR Pablo Fischer (pablo@pablo.com.mx). COPYRIGHT Copyright (C) 2009 by Pablo Fischer. This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.