faux is a traitless Rust mocking framework for creating mock objects out of user-defined structs. For more on faux's capabilities, take a look at the release blog post or the documentation.

faux creates mocks of your structs to be used in unit tests, making them fast and reliable.

extern crate faux; #[cfg_attr(test, faux::create)] #[faux::create] pub struct NetworkClient { /* data here */ } #[cfg_attr(test, faux::methods)] #[faux::methods] impl NetworkClient { pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { /* does some complicated stuff, maybe network calls */ 5 } } struct Service { client: NetworkClient, } impl Service { fn do_stuff(&self) -> i32 { self.client.fetch(3) } } #[cfg(test)] #[test] fn service_does_the_right_thing() { let mut client = NetworkClient::faux(); faux::when!(client.fetch).safe_then(|i| { assert_eq!(i, 3, "expected service to send '3'"); 10 }); let subject = Service { client }; let id = subject.do_stuff(); assert_eq!(id, 10); } fn main() { let mut client = NetworkClient::faux(); faux::when!(client.fetch).safe_then(|i| { assert_eq!(i, 3, "expected service to send '3'"); 10 }); let subject = Service { client }; let id = subject.do_stuff(); assert_eq!(id, 10); }

DISCLAIMER: this is a simplified version of how faux works as of February 2020, which may change in future versions. To see the most up to date transformations of your code, use cargo-expand

faux uses attributes to transform your structs into mockable versions of themselves at compile time.

The rest of the section focuses on code that looks like this:

#![allow(unused)] fn main() { pub struct NetworkClient { /* data here */ } impl NetworkClient { pub fn new() -> Self { NetworkClient { /* data here */ } } pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { /* does some complicated stuff, maybe network calls */ 5 } } }

faux , or any other mocking framework, needs to do two things to the code snippet above: create a fake version of NetworkClient , and provide a way to inject fake implementations of its methods.

faux provides the attribute macro #[faux::create] to transform a struct definition into a mockable version of itself.

#![allow(unused)] fn main() { extern crate faux; #[faux::create] pub struct NetworkClient { /* data here */ } }

From faux 's perspective, a mockable version of a struct:

Is indistinguishable from the original struct, from a user's perspective

Can instantiate the original version because we do not always want a mocked instance

Can instantiate a mocked version without any additional data

At a high level, faux 's transformation process consists of the following steps:

Check that all struct fields are private; fail to compile otherwise Clones the definition of the struct Rename the original definition such that it is saved elsewhere Replace the cloned definition's fields with an enum of two variants, the fake and the real version

#![allow(unused)] fn main() { // same name so no one can tell the difference pub struct NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient); enum MaybeNetworkClient { // a fake does not need any data about the real network client Fake, // in case the user wants a real network client Real(RealNetworkClient) } // save the real definition somewhere else so it may still be created struct RealNetworkClient { /* data here */ } impl NetworkClient { // provide a method to create a fake instance of NetworkClient fn fake_please() -> NetworkClient { NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient::Fake) } } }

The code snippet above is a simplified version of the transformation #[faux::create] performs on NetworkClient . The mock requirements are satisfied:

Indistinguishable from the original struct Although the transformed struct no longer has its original fields, callers that expect a NetworkClient continue to work as expected (provided they do not try to directly access those fields) External information is kept the same (i.e., visibility, attributes)

Real instances can be created The internal enum can be either a fake or a real instance The real definition is kept in a struct with a different name for instantiation

Mock instances can be created The fake variant of the internal enum knows nothing about RealNetworkClient



faux provides the attribute macro #[faux::methods] to transform method definitions inside an impl block into mockable versions of themselves.

extern crate faux; #[faux::create] pub struct NetworkClient {} #[faux::methods] impl NetworkClient { pub fn new() -> Self { NetworkClient { /* data here */ } } pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { /* does some complicated stuff, maybe network calls */ 5 } } fn main() {}

From faux 's perspective, a mockable version of a method:

Is indistinguishable from the original method, from a user's perspective

Can call the real method because we do not always want a mocked method

Can run arbitrary code provided by the user

At a high level, faux 's transformation process consists of the following steps:

Clone the impl block Make the original impl block be an impl of the mocked struct instead Add when_* methods per public method in the cloned impl Modify the cloned methods to either proxy to or call the real instance Proxy the associated functions and private methods to the original definitions

pub struct NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient); enum MaybeNetworkClient { Fake, Real(RealNetworkClient) } pub struct RealNetworkClient {} // the numbers in the comments represent sections // that will be explained in further detail later impl NetworkClient { // (1) pub fn new() -> Self { Self(MaybeNetworkClient::Real(RealNetworkClient::new())) } // (2) pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { // proxy to the real method for real instances // somehow get fake data when it is a mocked instance match self { Self(MaybeNetworkClient::Real(real)) => real.fetch(a), Self(MaybeNetworkClient::Fake) => { /* somehow get the fake data */ 10 } } } } // (3) mod real_impl_of_NetworkClient { // (3) type NetworkClient = super::RealNetworkClient; use super::*; impl NetworkClient { pub fn new() -> Self { NetworkClient { /* data here */ } } pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { /* does some complicated stuff, maybe network calls */ 5 } } } fn main() {}

The code snippet above is a simplified version of the transformation #[faux::method] performs on the impl block. This is a bit more complicated than making a mockable struct and involves the following components:

Returning a real instance Because we are only worried about mocking instances of methods, we can proxy to the real implementations of any associated function (a function that does not have a receiver, e.g., &self or self: Rc<Self> ). However, because the new function above returns an instance of the mockable struct, while the real implementation returns an instance of the real struct, we need to to wrap the RealNetworkClient instance inside a NetworkClient . Methods Methods are fairly simple to handle. We match on the receiver, and then proxy to the real implementation if we are a real instance or somehow get the mock data if we are not. More on this somehow later. The real implementation Similar to the mockable struct case, we want to keep our real implementation somewhere so it can be called when needed. The hitch is that our real implementation refers to NetworkClient as if it were the real struct, e.g., when making a new instance, returning an object, or as the name in the impl statement. While we could go through the entire impl block and try to rename every mention of NetworkClient with RealNetworkClient , a lazier approach that works just fine is to use a type alias. However, type aliases are not yet allowed inside impl blocks. To get around this limitation, we put the alias and the real implementation in their own internal mod.

We have now satisfied the first two requirements of what constitutes a mockable method.

Is indistinguishable from the original method By keeping the same function and method signatures, external callers cannot tell that the methods have been transformed.

Real methods can be called The real implementation is saved so it can be called for real instances.



However, we have not satisfied the third requirement. There is no way for the user to provide arbitrary code to be run during tests.

Ideally, we would like to have different mock instances of the same struct, each with their own mocked methods. This means that the mocked information belongs to the mocked instance. This changes our definition of our mockable NetworkClient from:

#![allow(unused)] fn main() { struct NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient); enum MaybeNetworkClient { Fake, Real(RealNetworkClient), } pub struct RealNetworkClient { /* some data */ } }

to:

#![allow(unused)] fn main() { struct NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient); enum MaybeNetworkClient { Fake(MockStore), Real(RealNetworkClient), } pub struct RealNetworkClient { /* some data */ } #[derive(Default)] pub struct MockStore { /* store mocks somehow */ } impl MockStore { pub fn get_mock(&self, name: &str) -> Option<Mock> { /* somehow return the mock matching the name */ None } } pub struct Mock { /* represent a mock somehow */ } impl Mock { pub fn call<I,O>(self, inputs: I) -> O { /* somehow produce an output */ panic!() } } }

We have added a MockStore to the Fake variant of the MaybeNetworkClient enum. This allows us to store and retrieve mocks when we have a fake instance of NetworkClient . We derive Default for MockStore to denote that it can be created without any data. This is important because we need to be able to create a mock instance of the NetworkClient from nothing.

We can now now flesh out the mockable definition of fetch :

impl NetworkClient { pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { match self { Self(MaybeNetworkClient::Real(real)) => real.fetch(a), Self(MaybeNetworkClient::Fake(mock_store)) => { mock_store // retrieve the mock using the name of the function .get_mock("fetch") // check the mock was setup; panic if it was not .expect("no mock found for method 'fetch'") // pass in fetch's parameter to the mocked method .call(a) } } } } pub struct NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient); enum MaybeNetworkClient { Fake(MockStore), Real(RealNetworkClient) } pub struct RealNetworkClient {} impl Mock { pub fn call<I,O>(self, inputs: I) -> O { panic!() } } pub struct MockStore {} pub struct Mock {} impl MockStore { fn get_mock(&self, name: &'static str) -> Option<Mock> { None } } impl RealNetworkClient { pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { 5 } } fn main() {}

We are now just missing one key piece: saving mocks.

#![allow(unused)] fn main() { pub struct NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient); enum MaybeNetworkClient { Fake(MockStore), Real(RealNetworkClient) } pub struct RealNetworkClient {} pub struct MockStore {} impl NetworkClient { pub fn when_fetch(&mut self) -> When<'_, u32, i32> { match &mut self.0 { MaybeNetworkClient::Fake(store) => When { store, method_name: "fetch", _marker: std::marker::PhantomData, }, MaybeNetworkClient::Real(_) => panic!("cannot mock a real instance"), } } } // store the expected inputs and output in the type struct When<'q, I, O> { method_name: &'static str, store: &'q mut MockStore, _marker: std::marker::PhantomData<(*const I, *const O)>, } impl<I, O> When<'_, I, O> { pub fn then(self, mock: impl FnMut(I) -> O) { self.store.save_mock(self.method_name, mock); } } impl MockStore { pub fn save_mock<I,O>(&mut self, name: &'static str, f: impl FnMut(I) -> O) { /* somehow save the mock with the given name */ } } }

The When struct above provides a method to that saves the given mock inside the MockStore . We have also added a method to NetworkClient that returns an instance of When with information about the fetch method, thus allowing us to mock fetch .

We can now write code that looks like this:

fn main() { let mut mock = NetworkClient::fake_please(); mock.when_fetch().then(|i| i as i32); let fetched = mock.fetch(3); assert_eq!(fetched, 3); } struct NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient); enum MaybeNetworkClient { Fake(MockStore), Real(RealNetworkClient), } pub struct RealNetworkClient { /* some data */ } #[derive(Default)] pub struct MockStore { /* store mocks somehow */ } impl MockStore { pub fn get_mock(&self, name: &str) -> Option<Mock> { None } pub fn save_mock<I,O>(&mut self, name: &'static str, f: impl FnMut(I) -> O) { } } pub struct Mock {} impl Mock { pub fn call<I,O>(self, inputs: I) -> O { panic!() } } impl NetworkClient { pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { match self { Self(MaybeNetworkClient::Real(real)) => real.fetch(a), Self(MaybeNetworkClient::Fake(mock_store)) => { mock_store // retrieve the mock using the name of the function .get_mock("fetch") // check the mock was setup; panic if it was not .expect("no mock found for method 'fetch'") // pass in fetch's parameter to the mocked method .call(a) } } } fn fake_please() -> NetworkClient { NetworkClient(MaybeNetworkClient::Fake(MockStore::default())) } pub fn when_fetch(&mut self) -> When<'_, u32, i32> { match &mut self.0 { MaybeNetworkClient::Fake(store) => When { store, method_name: "fetch", _marker: std::marker::PhantomData, }, MaybeNetworkClient::Real(_) => panic!("cannot mock a real instance"), } } } struct When<'q, I, O> { method_name: &'static str, store: &'q mut MockStore, _marker: std::marker::PhantomData<(*const I, *const O)>, } impl<I, O> When<'_, I, O> { pub fn then(self, mock: impl FnMut(I) -> O) { self.store.save_mock(self.method_name, mock); } } impl RealNetworkClient { pub fn new() -> Self { RealNetworkClient {} } pub fn fetch(&self, a: u32) -> i32 { 5 } }

You may have noticed that we largely omitted the implementation of MockStore and Mock . The implementations of these are pretty hairy, and thus out of scope for this blog post. However, feel free to read the source code of faux for more information. In reality, MockStore and Mock requires a few more bounds on the injected mock to both enable safe mocking and provide a version with more relaxed bounds that is gated by unsafe .

You have now seen a simplified version of the code faux produces. Remember that faux 's expansions should be gated to only your test cfg, thus having no compile or run time impact on a cargo check or cargo build . If I missed anything, or if something was not clear, feel free to submit an issue or PR to faux as the blog also lives there as a GitHub page. I will do my best to clarify or to update the blog.

Feedback is always appreciated. Happy mocking!