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From there you can check/uncheck the changes you want to apply either at a table or row level.

Figure 55-15 shows the comparison results between two versions of a simple Products database.

The upper pane shows the tables and the lower pane shows the records for the selected table. The

Different Records tab in the lower pane will show side by side each Source and Target column, so

you can see where the differences are.

fiGure 55-15

Database Tools .

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The Data Compare tool is only able to work with tables in the default schema of

the database.

From the toolbar you can select either Write Updates or Export to Editor to manually apply

the changes.

static analysis

Visual Studio 2010 Premium and Ultimate include static analysis tools for databases as well as for

code. To run the static analysis tools, select Data . Static Analysis . Run. Currently, 14 rules are

spread across three categories to help you develop databases: Design, Naming, and Performance.

transact- sql editor

This editor allows you to work with Transact-SQL (T-SQL) code directly in Visual Studio. To open

it, you can double-click a .sql file in Solution Explorer or from the Schema View of a Database

Project. Another option is to start with a blank editor — to do this go to Data .

Transact - SQL

Editor and select New Query Connection. Now you can start to write your T-SQL, with nice

coloring and most of Visual Studio’s shortcuts and features like bookmarks and search and replace.

From the toolbar or the T-SQL Editor menu, you can validate syntax, execute your code, include

client statistics, disconnect to work offline, and reconnect once you need to run a query. When you

run the queries, the results can be displayed on a grid or text format or be exported to a file. You

can also change this behavior from the menu or toolbar.

best Practices

The following is a list of best practices we compiled through our work with Database Professionals

and which have worked for us on small and medium-sized projects:

.

Each developer works with his own local SQL database instance, one for development and

another for testing. This is necessary to isolate uncommitted and untested changes and avoid

affecting other developers working on the database at the same time. It is strictly necessary

for managed-code debugging purposes, because starting a debugging session will cause all

managed threads to stop. From the project properties for Database Projects, you can specify

the database to target for each Solution Configuration, but SQL-CLR projects can only

target one database.

.

Each developer works with two databases, one for development and one for unit testing

because different data will be used for each.

.

Use (local) or 127.0.0.1 for the hostname instead of, say, MikesComputer or 192.168.2.6,

which would work only on one machine.

.

If you are using database instances, be sure all your developers have an instance with the

same name.

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.

All developers should have the same SQL Server version. Although SQL Server Express can

be used for design-time validation and testing purposes, some features, like Text Indexing,

are not supported.

.

Clear the Block Incremental Deployment if Data Loss Might Occur checkbox in the project

properties window for the Solution Configuration used for Test Databases. Because you will

have a Data Generation Plan, data will be easy to re-create after changes have been made to

the schema.

.

When deploying to a production database, build the Database Project and then modify the

build script to manually deploy it to the server. You can lean on the Schema Comparison

tool to have a more granular view of the changes made.

suMMary

In this chapter, you saw a couple of advanced features that are part of Visual Studio 2010 Premium.

All of these target quality improvement. Code Metrics and the Analysis Tool will analyze your code

or binaries statically, collecting metrics and evaluating rules. The metrics will be useful to see how

maintainable your code is. For the analysis, you have rules for different categories that will help you

ensure that your code will perform well before it runs. On the other hand, the Profiling Tools will

evaluate your code at run time and IntelliTrace lets you explore the execution of your application

during a debugging session.

This chapter covered some of the most important features for database developers. You saw how

easy it is to develop code for SQL-CLR and how the Offline Schema Projects will help you work on

a team, versioning and merging your changes. Advanced features like refactoring and unit testing

will change the way you develop databases, and tools like Schema Compare, Data Compare, Data

Generation, and the T-SQL Editor will support the process as well.

56 56

Visual studio Ultimate

for Testers

what’s in this chaPter?

.

Testing web and windows applications

.

Identifying relationships between code and tests

.

Planning, executing, and coordinating testing tasks

.

Managing test environments

You can test an application in many ways. Chapter 11 introduced the concept of unit tests,

which are small executable pieces of code that verify a particular aspect of behavior for a

single method or class. The first part of this chapter examines the advanced tools built into

Visual Studio that are available for other testing tasks, including testing web applications and

databases. You also learn how to track the relationships between tests and code.

The 2010 release of Visual Studio also contains a new product called Test and Lab Manager.

This tool is designed for testers to interact directly with Team Foundation Servers and manage

test plans, suites, and cases. Test and Lab Manager is available with the Ultimate edition of

Visual Studio and as a part of a separate pack called Test Elements.

autoMated tests

An automated test is a piece of code that verifies the behavior of your application without

any user input or control. Once the system has been asked to run an automated test, it can

be left unattended until it has completed. To create a new automated test from Visual Studio

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2010, use the Test . New Test menu option to display the Add New Test dialog shown in

Figure 56 - 1.

fiGure 56-1

Depending on which edition of Visual Studio you have, you might not have all of

the tests shown in Figure 56 - 1. Coded UI Tests and Database Unit Tests are only

available in the Premium and Ultimate editions. Web Tests and Load Tests are

only available in the Ultimate edition. The rest of the automated tests are available

in all three editions.

web Performance tests

This type of automated test simulates web requests and allows you to inspect the responses and

evaluate different conditions to determine if the test passes. When you create a new Web Test,

Internet Explorer opens with the Web Test Recorder enabled, as shown in Figure 56-2. Navigate

to and around your site as if you were a normal user. Once done, simply click Stop. This opens the

Web Test’s designer shown in Figure 56-3. There you can customize your test, adding validation

and extraction rules, context parameters, comments, data sources, and calls to other Web Tests, or

inserting transactions. You can also specify response time goals for requests.

You will often need to run the same set of tests against different web servers; to do this you

configure which server the test runs against as a context parameter. From the Web Test Designer

you can right-click the main node and select Parameterize Web Servers. Visual Studio will inspect

the URLs in each request and determine the context parameters it will need to create.

automated Tests .

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You can link your requests using the output from one of them as input for the next; to do this, you

add extraction rules to a specific request. You can extract from fields, attributes, HTTP headers,

hidden fields, and text, or even use regular expressions. The result of an extraction will set a context

parameter, which can then be used, for example, as a form or query string parameter in further

requests. You could add a product and then search for it using the ID in another request.

fiGure 56-2

fiGure 56-3

You can add form and query string parameters from the context menu of a request. By selecting

a form or query string parameter from the properties window, you can set its value to a context

parameter or bind it to a data source.

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No test framework would be complete without validations. When you record a test, a Response

URL Validation Rule is added asserting that the response URL is the same as the recorded

response URL. This is not enough for most scenarios. From the context menu at a Web Test or

request level, you can add validation rules. You can check that a form field or attribute has a certain

value or that a particular tag is included, find some text, or ascertain that the request doesn’t take

more than a specified length of time.

Double-clicking the .testrunconfig file in Solution Explorer allows you to further customize

how Web Tests are run. There you can choose the number of iterations, the browser and network

type, and whether the test engine should simulate think times. You can have many Test Run

Configurations and from the Test menu select the active one.

Web Tests, as well as any other type of test, are displayed in the Test List Editor window as you

saw in Chapter 11. From there you can run your Web Test and group it inside a particular test list.

You can also run it directly from the Web Test Designer. Once a test is run you can see its details

by double-clicking it in the Test Results window. To open this window, select Test Results from the

Test Windows menu. There you can see each request’s status, total time, and bytes. When you select

a request you will see the details of the selected request and received response, values of the context

parameters, validations and extraction rules, and a web-browser-like view displaying the web page.

An example is shown in Figure 56-4.

fiGure 56-4

If you need additional flexibility, you can code the Web Tests using .NET and the Web Testing

Framework. The best way to learn how to use the framework and start coding your test is by

generating code for a recorded Web Test. You have this option in the Web Test context menu.

automated Tests .

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Although Visual Studio provides some ASP.NET-specific features, you can use

Web Tests for sites built using other technologies.

load tests

Whereas web and load testing are meant to test functional requirements, Load Tests will run a set

of tests repeatedly so you can see how your application will perform. When you create a new Load

Test, you are presented with a wizard that guides you through the necessary steps. First, you need to

create a scenario; here you will define if you want to use think times. When you recorded the Web

Tests, the time you took between each request was also recorded and can be used as the think time.

It can be edited for each Web Test request in the properties window.

As part of the scenario, you will define the load pattern; for example, a constant load of 100 users

or a load incrementing by 10 every 10 seconds until you get to 200 users. The next steps, Test,

Browser, and Network Mix, define how tests will be run by virtual users, specify which browsers

will be used to run the tests, and determine the kinds of network that will be simulated. In the Test

Mix step you can add Generic, Ordered, and Web Tests.

In the Counter Sets step, you add the computers that you want to monitor and the performance

counters you are interested in. For example, you can monitor your Database Server and IIS. In the

last step, Run Settings, you can specify the test duration or test iterations, how often samples will be

taken for performance counters, a test description, how many identical errors will be recorded, and

the validation level. We defined a validation level for each Validation

Rule in our Web Tests. Because evaluation of these rules can be

expensive, in Load Tests only rules with a level equal to or below

the specified validation level will be evaluated.

When you click Finish, you are presented with the Load Test Designer

as shown in Figure 56-5. There you can add additional scenarios,

counter sets, or new run settings.

When you run the tests, you will see the Load Test Monitor; by

default it will show the Graphs view. In the left-side pane you have a

tree view of the counters that are being collected. You can select items

there to add them to the graphics. From the toolbar, you can change

to Summary or Tables view, export to Excel or CSV, and add analysis

notes. In the Graphs view at the bottom, you will have a legends pane

as shown in Figure 56-6. There you can select/deselect the counters

that you want to include in the graphs. While the test is running, the

monitor is updated on each sample interval. In the Tables view, you

can see the Requests, Errors, Pages, SQL Trace, Tests, Thresholds,

and Transactions.

fiGure 56-5

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fiGure 56-6

Thresholds are particularly important. These are values for each performance counter that will allow

you to spot problems. In the graphs, you can see points where violations occurred marked with a

warning or error icon.

Test load agent

For large-scale applications, one computer might not be enough to simulate the desired load. Visual

Studio Team System 2010 Test Load Agent can distribute the work across different machines. It can

simulate approximately 1,000 users per processor. This product requires a separate installation and

requires one controller and at least one agent. To configure the environment, select Administer Test

Controller from the Test menu. There you can select a controller and add agents. Then, from the