This document serves as an introduction to Behavior Driven Development (BDD) using the Behat framework, outlining its principles, methodologies, and the essential steps for implementation. It covers the importance of focusing on business value, the structure of writing features and scenarios, and provides guidance on using the Behat tool effectively. Additionally, it includes best practices for creating feature files, managing tests, and provides resources for further learning.

2. Welcome to Las Vegas!

3. Session Breakdown
Preface (this)
Intro to BDD
Intro to Behat
Build some Tests

4. Why Are You Here?
What is your role in the development lifecycle?
What is your reason for attending this session?
What do you hope to get out of this session?
What is your experience level with PHP, Behat,
and BDD?

5. Pre-Run Checklist
Make sure you have:
PHP 5.6+ w/Composer
https://github.com/aenglander/bdd-with-behat-for-
beginners
Selenium Server and a browser with the Selenium
driver (Optional)

6. Gotchas
Missing one of these extensions:
curl
mbstring
openssl
No default timezone in PHP.ini

8. What is BDD?
BDD is business driven, user focused, and test first.
It focuses on delivering business value as effectively
and efficiently as possible while maintaining
consistent quality throughout the entire application.
BDD is a methodology built around the principles of
lean development, extreme programming, test driven
development, and domain driven design.

9. What BDD Provides
Better understanding of the business requirement for
development and QA
Better understanding of existing features for the
business
Better communication via a ubiquitous language
Real insight into the business effect of a defect

10. What BDD Doesn’t Provide
The answer to all your problems
A replacement for unit testing
A replacement for manual testing
Super easy to implement everywhere right this second
A measure of code quality

11. Failed to Assert False is True
or
How I learned to love BDD

13. Stay Focused
It is crucial to the success of BDD to focus on what
value a feature provides to the business.
Always understand the the role of the user and
their relationship to the feature.
Do not get distracted by the technical aspects of
the implementation.

14. Story BDD Hierarchy
Feature
Background (optional)
Scenario
Step Step
Scenario
Step Step

15. Writing Features
Applications are comprised of features
BDD discretely separates each feature into its
very own set of tests
Separated use cases into scenarios

16. Narrative
Feature narratives are written similarly to Agile/Scrum
stories and must answer these questions:
What is the business benefit?
Who is the beneficiary?
What is the action performed?

17. Background
A background should contain steps common to all, or
at least most, scenarios to prepare the application
environment for the scenarios.
Background steps should be tested elsewhere as part
of another feature.
Steps failing in the background steps will identify that
the failure is not related to the feature.

18. Scenario
A scenarios should contain a descriptive narrative
Scenarios work in a manner similar to unit tests by arranging
the environment necessary to begin the test, perform
actions, and then assert that the expected results have been
attained
Scenarios should not test multiple features. Do not perform
actions after assertions.

19. Scenario Outline
Scenario outlines use a common set of steps with
placeholders for data provided in a data table.
They are a replacement for multiple scenarios in which
data is the only differentiator and does not define the
feature. Adding sales tax would be an example of a
feature in which the data in the action and assertion
would be different.

20. Step
Steps do one of the following:
Arrange the environment
Perform an action
Assert a result of the previous actions
Steps should be reasonably reusable
Steps should be aggregated for simplification when
arranging the environment

22. What is Behat?
Open source Behavior Driven Development
framework for PHP
Official PHP implementation of Cucumber
One of the easiest Cucumber implementations to
get up and running quickly
Good documentation: http://docs.behat.org

23. Installation
PHAR installation
Single global install
One version for feature contexts
Project Installation
Composer based install as dependency
Version and dependencies tied to project

24. Components
Command line executable – behat
Configuration file – behat.yml
Feature context(s)
Feature Files

25. Command Line Executable
Allows for initializing the environment
Running features
Features and scenarios filterable by tags
Chooses environment
Listing step definitions

26. Configuration File
Split up into profiles
(inherit from default)
Configures custom
autoloader path
Defines global tag filters
Defines output
formatters
Defines feature suites
Configures extensions

27. Feature Context
Defines steps
May extend other contexts
May access other contexts
May add hooks for pre/post tag, step, scenario,
feature, and suite execution.

28. Gherkin
Gherkin is a Domain Specific Language (DSL)
utilized to write Features in Behat. It uses key words
to identify the type of step:
Given – Arrange
When – Act
Then - Assert

29. Example Gherkin
Feature: Home Page
Scenario: Login Link
Given I am on the homepage
When I click " Login"
Then I will be on the "LaunchKey | Log in"
page

30. Step Backing Code
Method on a feature context
Contains doc block annotated (@) matchers
Support defined in context. Defaults to Turnip
Supports Turnip and regular expressions
Can contain examples doc block
Can contain descript in the doc block

31. Example Step
/**
* Opens homepage
* Example: Given I am on "/"
* Example: When I go to "/"
* Example: And I go to "/”
* @Given (I )am on :path
* @When (I )go to :path
*/
public function visitPath($path)
{
$this->browser->open($path);
}

33. Create a Project
Composer “init”
Add requirements
Behat “init”
Add Contexts to Config

34. Verify Your Install
Run “vendor/bin/behat –h”
You should see the help text

35. Initialize Behat
Initialize the behat project via the Behat CLI
with the --init flag
Verify by running “vendor/bin/behat”

36. Add Mink to Config
• Add the extension to the default profile
• Set the base URL
• Add the drivers

37. Add Contexts to Config
• Add Mink context to get access to pre-built
browser steps
• Add project context to make custom steps

38. Verify Configuration
Run “vendor/bin/behat –dl”
You should see a LOT of steps
Run “vendor/bin/behat –di”
You should see additional information for the
steps

39. Lets Write A Feature Test
User Story:
In order to use the site
As a site visitor
I can access the website

40. Let’s Make Another
Requirement:
In order to be a user
As a visitor
I can register for a user account

41. What About Clean Up
Requirement:
E-Mail Address is the user identifier and must be
unique among all users
We’re going to have to clean up users in a hook

42. Steps Need to Be Intuitive
Checking for errors on registration submission
will require a custom step with some additional
logic

43. Add Other Requirements
E-Mail Address is the user identifier and must be
unique among all users
Name is required and captures the users name
Password is required and must utilize a verification
field to ensure correct password entry

44. Finish Up Labs/Examples
Server and Behat features found in GitHub:
https://github.com/aenglander/bdd-with-behat-for-
beginners
Master branch is Behat
Master is tagged to go step by step
Server branch is server

45. Selenium
Industry standard
Server with remote API
Direct integration with Behat/Mink via Selenium
Driver
Can be used headless with PhantomJS via
GhostDriver implementation

46. Using Selenium Server
Add config to bahat.yml and specify browser
Apply @javascript tag to scenarios or a feature
Start Selenium Standalone Server
Run tests

47. Selenium Grid
Allows for multiple simultaneous test runs, multiple
browser versions, and multiple operating systems
One Hub and Multiple Nodes
Uses same app as Standalone Server
Can be flakey and hard to manage

48. Sauce Labs/BrowserStack
Special Drivers for Sauce Labs and
BrowserStack
Not well documented but work very well
Allow for a “Grid” style environment without
managing the Grid

49. Configuring Mink Driver
Poorly documented
Easy to figure out the settings by looking at the
driver factories. See:
vendor/behat/mink-
extension/src/Behat/MinkExtension/ServiceContainer
/Driver

50. Best Practices
Feature files contain one Feature
Features should be more business than
technical focused

51. Best Practices (cont.)
Use the three A’s
Arrange – Background – Given
Act – When
Assert - Then

52. Best Practices (cont.)
Make steps visually verifiable. Feature files
should be able to serve as documentation
Clean up after yourself
Scenarios should be idempotent
Spend the time to do it the right way