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mix test.interactive is an interactive test runner for ExUnit tests.

Based on Louis Pilfold's wonderful mix-test.watch and inspired by Jest's interactive watch mode, mix test.interactive allows you to dynamically change which tests should be run with a few keystrokes.

It allows you to easily switch between running all tests, stale tests, or failed tests. Or, you can run only the tests whose filenames contain a substring. You can also control which tags are included or excluded, modify the maximum number of failures allowed, repeat the test suite until a failure occurs, specify the test seed to use, and toggle tracing on and off. Includes an optional "watch mode" which runs tests after every file change.

Installation

mix test.interactive can be added as a dependency to your project, or it can be run from an Elixir script without being added to your project.

Installing as a Dependency

To install mix test.interactive as a dependency of your project, making it available to anyone working in the project, add mix_test_interactive to the list of dependencies in your project's mix.exs file:

def deps do
  [
    {:mix_test_interactive, "~> 4.1", only: :dev, runtime: false}
  ]
end

Running from an Elixir Script

If you are working on a 3rd-party project, you may not be able to add mix test.interactive as a dependency. In this case, it is possible to invoke mix test.interactive from an Elixir script.

To accomplish this, put the following script somewhere on your PATH and make it executable.

#!/usr/bin/env elixir

Mix.install([
  {:mix_test_interactive, "~> 4.1"}
])

MixTestInteractive.run(System.argv())

As an example, let's assume you've named the script mti_exec.

Now you can cd to the project's root directory, and run mti_exec. The script will accept all of mix_test_interactive's command-line options and allow you to use any of its interactive commands.

Usage 

mix test.interactive <options> [-- <mix test arguments>]
mix test.interactive <mix test arguments>
mix test.interactive --help
mix test.interactive --version

Your tests will run immediately (and every time a file changes).

Options

mix test.interactive understands the following options, most of which correspond to configuration settings below.

Note that, if you want to pass both mix test.interactive options and mix test arguments, you must separate them with --.

If an option is provided on the command line, it will override the same option specified in the configuration.

  • --(no-)clear: Clear the console before each run (default false).
  • --command <command> [--arg <arg>]: Custom command and arguments for running tests (default: "mix" with no arguments). NOTE: Use --arg multiple times to specify more than one argument.
  • --exclude <regex>: Exclude files/directories from triggering test runs (default: ["~r/\.#/", "~r{priv/repo/migrations}"]) NOTE: Use --exclude multiple times to specify more than one regex.
  • --extra-extensions <extension>: Watch files with additional extensions (default: []).
  • --runner <module name>: Use a custom runner module (default: MixTestInteractive.PortRunner).
  • --task <task name>: Run a different mix task (default: "test").
  • --(no-)timestamp: Display the current time before running the tests (default: false).
  • --(no-)watch: Don't run tests when a file changes (default: true).

All of the <mix test arguments> are passed through to mix test on every test run.

mix test.interactive will detect the --exclude, --failed, --include, --only, --seed, and --stale options and use those as initial settings in interactive mode. You can then use the interactive mode commands to adjust those options as needed. It will also detect any filename or pattern arguments and use those as initial settings. Note that if you specify a pattern on the command-line, mix test.interactive will find all test files matching that pattern and pass those to mix test as if you had used the p command.

Patterns and filenames

mix test.interactive can take the same filename or filename:line_number patterns that mix test understands. It also allows you to specify one or more "patterns" - strings that match one or more test files. When you provide one or more patterns on the command-line, mix test.interactive will find all test files matching those patterns and pass them to mix test as if you had used the p command (described below).

Interactive Commands

After the tests run, you can use the interactive commands to change which tests will run.

  • a: Run all tests. Clears the --failed and --stale options as well as any patterns.
  • d <seed>: Run the tests with a specific seed.
  • d: Clear any previously specified seed.
  • f: Run only tests that failed on the last run (equivalent to the --failed option of mix test).
  • i <tags...>: Include tests tagged with the listed tags (equivalent to the --include option of mix test).
  • i: Clear any included tags.
  • m <max>: Specify the maximum number of failures allowed (equivalent to the --max-failures option of mix test).
  • m: Clear any previously specified maximum number of failures.
  • o <tags...>: Run only tests tagged with the listed tags (equivalent to the --only option of mix test).
  • o: Clear any "only" tags.
  • p: Run only test files that match one or more provided patterns. A pattern is the project-root-relative path to a test file (with or without a line number specification) or a string that matches a portion of full pathname. e.g. test/my_project/my_test.exs, test/my_project/my_test.exs:12:24 or my.
  • q: Exit the program. (Can also use Ctrl-D.)
  • r <count>: (Elixir 1.17.0 and later) Run tests up to <count> times until a failure occurs (equivalent to the --repeat-until-failure option of mix test).
  • r: (Elixir 1.17.0 and later) Clear the "repeat-until-failure" count.
  • s: Run only test files that reference modules that have changed since the last run (equivalent to the --stale option of mix test).
  • t: Turn test tracing on or off (equivalent to the --trace option of mix test).
  • x <tags...>: Exclude tests tagged with the listed tags (equivalent to the --exclude option of mix test).
  • x: Clear any excluded tags.
  • w: Turn file-watching mode on or off.
  • Enter: Re-run the current set of tests without requiring a file change.
  • ?: Show usage help.

Configuration

mix test.interactive can be configured with various options using application configuration. You can also use command line arguments to specify these configuration options, or to override configured options.

clear: Clear the console before each run

If you want mix test.interactive to clear the console before each run, you can enable this option in your config/dev.exs as follows:

# config/config.exs
import Config

if Mix.env == :dev do
  config :mix_test_interactive,
    clear: true
end

command: Use a custom command

By default, mix test.interactive uses mix test to run tests.

You might want to provide a custom command that does other things before or after running mix. In that case, you can customize the command used for running tests.

For example, you might want to provide a name for the test runner process to allow connection from other Erlang nodes. Or you might want to run other commands before or after running the tests.

In those cases, you can customize the command that mix test.interactive will use to run your tests. mix test.interactive assumes that the custom command ultimately runs mix under the hood (or at least accepts all of the same command-line arguments as mix). The custom command can either be a string or a {command, [..args..]} tuple.

Examples:

# config/config.exs
import Config

if Mix.env == :dev do
  config :mix_test_interactive,
    command: "path/to/my/test_runner.sh"
end
# config/config.exs
import Config

if Mix.env == :dev do
  config :mix_test_interactive,
    command: {"elixir", ["--sname", "name", "-S", "mix"]}
end

To run a different mix task instead, see the task option below.

exclude: Excluding files or directories

To stop changes to specific files or directories from triggering test runs, you can add exclude: regexp patterns to your config in mix.exs:

# config/config.exs
import Config

if Mix.env == :dev do
  config :mix_test_interactive,
    exclude: [~r/db_migration\/.*/,
              ~r/useless_.*\.exs/]
end

The default is exclude: [~r/\.#/, ~r{priv/repo/migrations}].

extra_extensions: Watch files with additional extensions

By default, mix test.interactive will trigger a test run when a known Elixir or Erlang file has changed, but not when any other file changes.

You can specify additional file extensions to be included with the extra_extensions option.

# config/config.exs
import Config

if Mix.env == :dev do
  config :mix_test_interactive,
    extra_extensions: ["json"]
end

mix test.interactive always watches files with the following extensions: .erl, .ex, .exs, .eex, .leex, .heex, .xrl, .yrl, and .hrl. To ignore files with any of these extensions, you can specify an exclude regexp (see above).

runner: Use a custom runner module

By default mix test.interactive uses an internal module named MixTestInteractive.PortRunner to run the tests. If you want to run the tests in a different way, you can supply your own runner module instead. Your module must implement the MixTestInteractive.TestRunner behaviour, either implicitly or explicitly.

# config/config.exs
import Config

if Mix.env == :dev do
  config :mix_test_interactive,
    runner: MyApp.FancyTestRunner
end

task: Run a different mix task

By default, mix test.interactive runs mix test.

Through the mix config it is possible to run a different mix task. mix test.interactive assumes that this alternative task accepts the same command-line arguments as mix test.

# config/config.exs
import Config

if Mix.env == :dev do
  config :mix_test_interactive,
    task: "custom_test_task"
end

The task is run with MIX_ENV set to test.

To use a custom command instead, see the command option above.

timestamp: Display the current time before running the tests

When timestamp is set to true, mix test.interactive will display the current time (UTC) just before running the tests.

# config/config.exs
import Config

if Mix.env == :dev do
  config :mix_test_interactive,
    timestamp: true
end

Compatibility Notes

On Linux you may need to install inotify-tools.

Desktop Notifications

You can enable desktop notifications with ex_unit_notifier.

Acknowledgements

This project started as a clone of the wonderful mix-test.watch project, which I've used and loved for years. I've added the interactive mode features to the existing feature set.

The idea for having an interactive mode comes from Jest and its incredibly useful interactive watch mode.

Copyright (c) 2021-2024 Randy Coulman

This work is free. You can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the MIT License. See the LICENSE.md file for more details.