Specification-Based Testing

Kind: activity

Layer: Computation Core

Record: architecture:specification-based-testing

Severity: recommended

Scope: function, API, module

Canonical: Ontology

The activity of deriving tests from a specification's stated behavior, independently of how the code implements it.

Listed in Architecture principles, after Formal Verification and before Property-Based Testing.

Requires

• Specification

Reinforces

• Correctness
• Contracts

Enables

• Behavior Validation

Conflicts with

• Implementation-Only Testing
• Mock Mirage

In tension with

• Spec Maintenance

Tensions

• Specification-Based Testing / Spec Maintenance

Contracts

• Test Coverage Kernel

Violated by

• Implementation-Only Testing

Severity

• recommended

Category

• Correctness / Determinism / Verification

Linked from

• What can drift, seen through how it drifts
• Anti-patterns
• Correctness / Determinism / Verification
• Core Vocabulary
• Correctness / Determinism / Verification
• Test coverage
• Severity levels
• The resolutions