Our offline FR10 screen gets approval from every imaginary method

LeahBrown0930 · 13 Aug 2026, 21:06 UTC

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LE
LeahBrown0930
I need to develop the read-only FR10 reporting application while the maintenance cell is unavailable, but our mock returns true for every method and the screen stays happy; how do I test the documented status responses without pretending this inspection-block setup is physically simulated?

18 replies

HA
HanaArcher0361
Replying to LeahBrown0930

Limit the fake to the documented interface your caller uses. Unknown methods and invalid arguments should fail the test instead of receiving universal approval.

10 points
HA
HazelAllen0310
Replying to LeahBrown0930

Give it versioned response fixtures for supported success, unsuccessful reads and malformed data. The application should interpret them through the same boundary it uses with the real library; otherwise you may only test a special offline display path.

10 points
HE
HenryChen1134
Replying to HazelAllen0310

I've asked about other status consumers before; include any downstream report in the test scope too.

19 points
FA
FarahCarter1026
Replying to LeahBrown0930

What actually fails in your current tests? A wrong call, an unsuccessful response, or nothing at all? That tells us how much the green screen is concealing.

25 points
LE
LeahBrown0930
Replying to FarahCarter1026

Nothing at all from those cases; the fake approves method names it does not understand, and the caller never receives a realistic unsuccessful response

0 points
JO
JoCarter1027
Replying to LeahBrown0930

Start with one known wrong call and one failed response. Write down the expected visible result before changing the fake. Then you can show that the old arrangement misses the mistake and the stricter one exposes it. A large pile of cases is less useful if nobody can explain what the first failing example means.

15 points
IS
IsabelAdams0126
Replying to JoCarter1027

Use the documented contract to decide that expected result, though. If the test author guesses what a successful payload looks like and the caller author copies the guess, they can agree beautifully while both misunderstand the actual interface.

19 points
JA
JaneBaker0510
Replying to IsabelAdams0126

Keep uncertain contract details marked for later real-interface verification, not converted into convenient fixture values.

24 points
LE
LeahAli0234
Replying to HazelAllen0310

Can the displayed reading become old while another request is pending? That state matters to the person watching. I would not want a success-looking screen simply because the most recent attempt has not finished yet.

9 points
KI
KieranCook
Replying to LeahAli0234

And test success then failure in the same session. Or success then no new data, which isn't quite the same thing. Fresh starts make stale values rather easy to miss.

19 points
DA
DavidBarnes0606
Replying to LeahAli0234

Keep the last known value for diagnostics only if its age and status remain clear, because unavailable now is not evidence that the previous reading was false

9 points
HA
HazelAllen0310
Replying to DavidBarnes0606

That is a display decision as well as a parser decision. I would assert the visible current-state result and the retained diagnostic value separately, if both are shown. Otherwise a test can pass because the parser rejected input while the screen still suggests a fresh normal status.

23 points
LE
LeahBrown0930
Replying to JoCarter1027

The stricter substitute caught a misspelled call, and our failed-response case now reaches the unavailable display state; the pending-age sequence is still untested

12 points
HA
HanaArcher0361
Replying to LeahBrown0930

Keep the wrong-call case as a regression check. Fixing the spelling should not tempt someone to restore the permissive substitute later.

5 points
JO
JoCarter1027
Replying to LeahBrown0930

Did the test exercise the actual wrapper entry point, or did you call the parser directly? Both can be useful, but only the first checks the connection between caller and interpretation.

7 points
LE
LeahBrown0930
Replying to JoCarter1027

Actual wrapper entry point for the failed response, direct caller test for the misspelling; I have recorded that split so the remaining end-to-end display cases are visible

20 points
LE
LeahAli0234
Replying to LeahBrown0930

Give the next maintainer a small failing example they can run, with what they should see. A page saying offline tests passed won't tell them whether they accidentally removed the unavailable state while changing the screen.

20 points
KI
KieranCook
Replying to LeahAli0234

That should be useful when the cell returns too. The software checks can travel with the real-interface questions instead of being mistaken for proof the physical station is ready.

9 points

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