Testing with Node.js

Testing enables you to identify bugs in your code quickly and efficiently. Test cases should be written to verify that each piece of code yields the expected output or results. The added benefit is that these tests can act as a form of documentation for the expected behaviors of your applications.

Unit testing is a type of testing where individual units of code are tested. Small unit tests provide a granular specification for your program to test against. Ensuring your code base is covered by unit tests aids the development, debugging, and refactoring process by providing a baseline measure of behavior and quality. Having a comprehensive test suite can lead to identifying bugs sooner, which can save time and money since the earlier a bug is found, the cheaper it is to fix.

This chapter will start by introducing some key techniques with the test runner built into recent versions of Node.js. We’ll also explore some popular testing frameworks. Testing...