Chapter 17 Mox rocks

17.1 Objectives

  • introduction to mock based tests
  • add the Mox package
  • investigate the Naive.Trader module
    • mock the Binance module
    • mock the NaiveLeader module
    • mock the Phoenix.PubSub module
    • mock the Logger module
  • implement a test of the Naive.Trader module
  • define an alias to run unit tests

17.2 Introduction to mock based tests

In the previous chapter, we’ve implemented the end-to-end test. It required a lot of prep work as well as we were able to see the downsides of this type of test clearly:

  • we will be unable to run more than one end-to-end test in parallel as they rely on the database’s state
  • we need to set up the database before every test run
  • we need to start processes in the correct order with the suitable parameters
  • we need to wait a (guessed) hardcoded amount of time that it will take to finish the trading(this is extremely bad as it will cause randomly failing tests as people will make the time shorter to speed up tests)
  • we wouldn’t be able to quickly pinpoint which part error originated from as the test spans over a vast amount of the system
  • logging was polluting our test output

How could we fix the above issues?

The most common way is to limit the scope of the test. Instead of testing the whole trading flow, we could focus on testing a single Naive.Trader process.

Focusing on a single trader process would remove the requirement for starting multiple processes before testing, but it would also bring its own challenges.

Let’s look at a concrete example:

When the Naive.Trader process starts, it subscribes to the TRADE_EVENTS:#{symbol} PubSub topic. It also broadcasts updates of the orders it placed to the ORDERS:#{symbol} PubSub topic.

How could we break the link between the Naive.Trader and the PubSub(or any other module it depends on)?

We could utilize the trick that we used for the Binance module. We could create a module that provides the same functions as the PubSub module.

We know that the trader process calls Phoenix.PubSub.subscribe/2 and Phoenix.PubSub.broadcast/3 functions. We could implement a module that contains the same functions:

defmodule Test.PubSub do
    def subscribe(_, _), do: :ok
    def broadcast(_, _, _), do: :ok
end

The above module would satisfy the PubSub’s functionality required by the Naive.Trader module, but this solution comes with a couple of drawbacks:

  • it doesn’t the passed values. It just ignores them, which is a missed opportunity to confirm that the PubSub module was called with the expected values.
  • we can’t define a custom implemention specific to test. This is possible by extending the implemention with test related returns(hack!)

Using the mox module would fix both of the problems mentioned above. With the mox module we can define add-hoc function implemention per test:

    # inside test file
    test ...
        Test.PubSubMock
        |> expect(:subscribe, fn (_module, "TRADE_EVENTS:XRPUSDT") -> :ok end)
        |> expect(:broadcast, fn (_module, "ORDERS:XRPUSDT", _order) -> :ok end)

There are multiple benefits to using the mox module instead of handcrafting the implementation:

  • it allows defining functions that will pattern match values specific to each test(as in the case of the “usual” pattern matching, they will break when called with unexpected values)
  • it allows defining implementations of the mocked functions based on incoming(test specific) values
  • it can validate that all defined mocked functions have been called by the test
  • it comes with its own tests, so we don’t need to test it as it would need with our custom handcrafted mimicking module implementation

But there’s a catch* ;)

For the mox to know what sort of functions the module provides, it needs to know its behaviour.

In Elixir, to define a behaviour of the module, we need to add the @callback attributes to it:

  defmodule Core.Test.PubSub do
    @type t :: atom
    @type topic :: binary
    @type message :: term

    @callback subscribe(t, topic) :: :ok | {:error, term}
    @callback broadcast(t, topic, message) :: :ok | {:error, term}
  end

A behaviour can be defined in a separate module if we are working with 3rd party module that doesn’t provide it(like in the case of the Phoenix.PubSub module).

Note: The additional benefit of using the behaviours is that we could tell Elixir that our module implements the behaviour by adding the @behaviour attribute:

def MyPubSub do
    @behaviour Core.Test.PubSub
    ...

Using the above will cause Elixir to validate at compile time that the MyPubSub module implements all functions defined inside the Core.Test.PubSub module(otherwise it will raise compilation error).

Let’s get back to the main topic. We figured out that we could mock all of the modules that the Naive.Trader depends on using the mox module.

But, how would we tell the Naive.Trader to use the mocked modules instead of the “real” ones when we run tests?

We could make all modules that the Naive.Trader depends on be dynamically injected from the configuration(based on the environment).

Another requirement to make mox work is to define the mocks upfront using the Mox.defmock/2 function. It will dynamically define a new module that will be limited by the passed behaviour(we will only be able to mock[inside tests] functions defined as a part of that behaviour).

To sum up, there are a few steps to get the mox running:

  • implement behaviours that we would like to mock(as most of the packages[like Phoenix.PubSub] are not coming with those)
  • define mock modules using the Mox.defmock function
  • modify the application’s configuration to use the mocked module(s)
  • specify mocked module’s expectation inside the test

Let’s move to the implementation.

17.3 Add the mox package

First let’s add the mox package to the naive application’s dependencies:

# /apps/naive/mix.exs
  ...
  defp deps do
    [
      ...
      {:mox, "~> 1.0", only: [:test, :integration]},
      ...

We can now run mix deps.get to fetch the mox package.

[Note] As we will add the mox’s mocking code into the test_helper.exs file, we need to make mox available in all test environments(both test and integration).

17.4 Investigate the Naive.Trader module

Let’s investigate the Naive.Trader module(/apps/naive/lib/naive/trader.ex). We are looking for all calls to other modules - we can see:

  • Logger.info/2
  • Phoenix.PubSub.subscribe/2
  • @binance_client.order_limit_buy/4
  • Naive.Leader.notify/2
  • @binance_client.get_order/3
  • @binance_client.order_limit_sell/4
  • Phoenix.PubSub.broadcast/3

So the Naive.Trader relies on four modules:

  • Logger
  • Phoenix.PubSub
  • Naive.Leader
  • @binance_client(either Binance or BinanceMock)

We will need to work through them one by one.

17.4.1 Mock the Binance module

Let’s start with the binance client, as it’s already a dynamic value based on the configuration.

Neither the Binance nor the BinanceMock(our dummy implementation) module doesn’t provide a behaviour - let’s fix that by defining the @callback attributes at the top of the BinanceMock module before the structs:

# /apps/binance_mock/lib/binance_mock.ex
  ...
  alias Binance.Order
  alias Binance.OrderResponse
  alias Core.Struct.TradeEvent

  @type symbol :: binary
  @type quantity :: binary
  @type price :: binary
  @type time_in_force :: binary
  @type timestamp :: non_neg_integer
  @type order_id :: non_neg_integer
  @type orig_client_order_id :: binary
  @type recv_window :: binary

  @callback order_limit_buy(
              symbol,
              quantity,
              price,
              time_in_force
            ) :: {:ok, %OrderResponse{}} | {:error, term}

  @callback order_limit_sell(
              symbol,
              quantity,
              price,
              time_in_force
            ) :: {:ok, %OrderResponse{}} | {:error, term}

  @callback get_order(
              symbol,
              timestamp,
              order_id,
              orig_client_order_id | nil,
              recv_window | nil
            ) :: {:ok, %Order{}} | {:error, term}

In the above code, we added three @callback attributes that define the binance client behaviour. For clarity, we defined a distinct type for each of the arguments.

As we now have a binance client behaviour defined, we can use it to define a mock using the Mox.defmock/2 function inside the test_helper.exs file of the naive application:

# /apps/naive/test/test_helper.exs
ExUnit.start()

Application.ensure_all_started(:mox) #1

Mox.defmock(Test.BinanceMock, for: BinanceMock) #2

First(#1), we need to ensure that the mox application has been started. Then(#2), we can tell the mox package to define the Test.BinanceMock module based on the BinanceMock behaviour.

As we defined the binance client behaviour and mock, we can update our configuration to use them. We want to keep using the BinanceMock module in the development environment, but for the test environment, we would like to set the mocked module generated by the mox package:

# /config/test.exs
config :naive,
  binance_client: Test.BinanceMock

17.4.2 Mock the NaiveLeader module

We can now move back to the Naive.Trader module to update all the hardcoded references to the Naive.Leader module with a dynamic attribute called @leader and add this attribute at the top of the module:

# /apps/naive/lib/trader.ex
  ...
  @leader Application.compile_env(:naive, :leader)
  ...
  @leader.notify(:trader_state_updated, new_state)
  ...
  @leader.notify(:trader_state_updated, new_state)
  ...
  @leader.notify(:rebuy_triggered, new_state)
  ...

As it was in case of the BinanceMock(our dummy implementation) module, the Naive.Leader module doesn’t provide a behaviour - let’s fix that by defining the @callback attributes at the top of the module:

# /apps/naive/lib/leader.ex
  ...
  @type event_type :: atom
  @callback notify(event_type, %Trader.State{}) :: :ok

In the above code, we added a single @callback attribute that defines the naive leader behaviour. For clarity, we defined a distinct type for the event_type arguments.

As we now have a naive leader behaviour defined, we can use it to define a mock using the Mox.defmock/2 function inside the test_helper.exs file of the naive application:

# /apps/naive/test/test_helper.exs
Mox.defmock(Test.Naive.LeaderMock, for: Naive.Leader)

In the above code, we’ve told the mox package to define the Test.Naive.LeaderMock module based on the Naive.Leader behaviour.

We are moving on to the configuration. As the Naive.Leader wasn’t part of the configuration, we need to add it to the default config and test config file.

First, let’s add the :leader key inside the config :naive in the default /config/config.exs configuration file:

# /config/config.exs
...
config :naive,
 binance_client: BinanceMock,
 leader: Naive.Leader,        # <= added
 ...

and then we need to apply the same update to the /config/test.exs configuration file(it will point to the module generated by the mox package - Test.Naive.LeaderMock):

# /config/test.exs
...
config :naive,
binance_client: Test.BinanceMock,
leader: Test.Naive.LeaderMock     # <= added
...

17.4.3 Mock the Phoenix.PubSub module

Mocking the Phoenix.PubSub dependency inside the Naive.Trader module will look very similar to the last two mocked modules.

Inside the Naive.Trader module we need to update all the references to the Phoenix.PubSub to an @pubsub_client attribute with value dependent on the configuration:

# /apps/naive/lib/trader.ex
  ...
  @pubsub_client Application.compile_env(:core, :pubsub_client)
  ...
    @pubsub_client.subscribe(
      Core.PubSub,
      "TRADE_EVENTS:#{symbol}"
    )
  ...
    @pubsub_client.broadcast(
      Core.PubSub,
      "ORDERS:#{order.symbol}",
      order
    )
  ...

The Phoenix.PubSub module doesn’t provide a behaviour. As we can’t modify its source, we need to create a new module to define the PubSub behaviour. Let’s create a new file called test.ex inside the /apps/core/lib/core directory with the following behaviour definition:

# /apps/core/lib/core/test.ex
defmodule Core.Test do
  defmodule PubSub do
    @type t :: atom
    @type topic :: binary
    @type message :: term

    @callback subscribe(t, topic) :: :ok | {:error, term}
    @callback broadcast(t, topic, message) :: :ok | {:error, term}
  end
end

As previously, we defined a couple of callbacks and additional types for each of their arguments.

Next, we will use the above behaviour to define a mock using the Mox.defmock/2 function inside the test_helper.exs file of the naive application:

# /apps/naive/test/test_helper.exs
Mox.defmock(Test.PubSubMock, for: Core.Test.PubSub)

In the above code, we’ve told the mox package to define the Test.PubSubMock module based on the Core.Test.PubSub behaviour.

The final step will be to append the :core, :pubsub_client configuration to the /config/config.exs file:

# /config/config.exs
config :core,                  # <= added
 pubsub_client: Phoenix.PubSub # <= added

and the test /config/test.exs configuration file:

# /config/test.exs
config :core,                  # <= added
pubsub_client: Test.PubSubMock # <= added

17.4.4 Mock the Logger module

Before we dive in, we should ask ourselves why we would mock the Logger module?

We could raise the logging level to error and be done with it. Yes, that would fix all debug/info/warning logs, but we would also miss an opportunity to confirm a few details (depends on what’s necessary for our use case):

  • you can ensure that the log was called when the tested function was run
  • you can pattern match the logging level
  • you can check the message. This could be useful if you don’t want to put sensitive information like banking details etc. inside log messages

Mocking the Logger dependency inside the Naive.Trader module will follow the same steps as the previous updates.

Inside the Naive.Trader module we need to update all the references to the Logger to an @logger attribute with value dependent on the configuration:

# /apps/naive/lib/trader.ex
  ...
  @logger Application.compile_env(:core, :logger)
  ...
    @logger.info("Initializing new trader(#{id}) for #{symbol}")
  ...
    @logger.info(
      "The trader(#{id}) is placing a BUY order " <>
        "for #{symbol} @ #{price}, quantity: #{quantity}"
    )
  ...
        @logger.info(
          "The trader(#{id}) is placing a SELL order for " <>
            "#{symbol} @ #{sell_price}, quantity: #{quantity}."
        )
  ...
        @logger.info("Trader's(#{id} #{symbol} buy order got partially filled")
  ...
      @logger.info("Trader(#{id}) finished trade cycle for #{symbol}")
  ...
      @logger.info("Trader's(#{id} #{symbol} SELL order got partially filled")
  ...
      @logger.info("Rebuy triggered for #{symbol} by the trader(#{id})")
  ...

The Logger module doesn’t provide a behaviour. As we can’t modify its source, we need to create a new module to define the Logger behaviour. Let’s place it inside the Core.Test namespace in the /apps/core/lib/core/test.ex file side by side with the PubSub behaviour with the following definition:

# /apps/core/lib/core/test.ex
defmodule Core.Test do
  ...
  defmodule Logger do
    @type message :: binary

    @callback info(message) :: :ok
  end
end

As previously, we defined a callback and additional type for the message argument.

Next, we will use the above behaviour to define a mock using the Mox.defmock/2 function inside the test_helper.exs file of the naive application:

# /apps/naive/test/test_helper.exs
Mox.defmock(Test.LoggerMock, for: Core.Test.Logger)

In the above code, we’ve told the mox package to define the Test.LoggerMock module based on the Core.Test.Logger behaviour.

The final step will be to append the :core, :logger configuration to the /config/config.exs file:

# /config/config.exs
config :core,                                   
  logger: Logger,                # <= added
  pubsub_client: Phoenix.PubSub

and the test /config/test.exs configuration file:

# /config/test.exs
config :core,                                   
  logger: Test.LoggerMock,        # <= added
  pubsub_client: Test.PubSubMock

This finishes the updates to the Naive.Trader module. We made all dependencies based on the configuration values. We can now progress to writing the test.

17.5 Implement a test of the Naive.Trader module

Finally, we can implement the unit test for the Naive.Trader module.

We will create a folder called naive inside the /apps/naive/test directory and a new file called trader_test.exs inside it.

Let’s start with an empty skeleton of the test tagged as unit:

# /apps/naive/test/naive/trader_test.exs
defmodule Naive.TraderTest do
  use ExUnit.Case
  doctest Naive.Trader

  @tag :unit
  test "Placing buy order test" do
  end
end

Let’s add the mox related code above the @tag :unit line:

# /apps/naive/test/naive/trader_test.exs
  import Mox                   # <= 1 

  setup :set_mox_from_context  # <= 2
  setup :verify_on_exit!       # <= 3

In the above code, we are:

  • importing the mox module so we will be able to use functions like expect/3
  • allowing any process to consume mocks defined by the test. This is crucial as tests are run as separate processes that would normally be the only ones allowed to use mocks that they define. Inside our test, we will start a new Naive.Trader process that needs to be able to access mocks defined in the test - hence this update
  • telling mox to verify that all the mocks defined in the tests have been called from within those tests. Otherwise, it will flag such cases as test errors

Inside our test, we need to define implementation for all the functions that the Naive.Trader relies on:

# /apps/naive/test/naive/trader_test.exs
  ...
  test "Placing buy order test" do
    Test.PubSubMock
    |> expect(:subscribe, fn _module, "TRADE_EVENTS:XRPUSDT" -> :ok end) # <= 1
    |> expect(:broadcast, fn _module, "ORDERS:XRPUSDT", _order -> :ok end)

    Test.BinanceMock
    |> expect(:order_limit_buy, fn "XRPUSDT", "464.360", "0.4307", "GTC" -> # <= 2
      {:ok,
       BinanceMock.generate_fake_order(
         "XRPUSDT",
         "464.360",
         "0.4307",
         "BUY"
       )
       |> BinanceMock.convert_order_to_order_response()}
    end)

    test_pid = self() # <= 3

    Test.Naive.LeaderMock
    |> expect(:notify, fn :trader_state_updated, %Naive.Trader.State{} ->
      send(test_pid, :ok) # <= 3
      :ok
    end)

    Test.LoggerMock
    |> expect(:info, 2, fn _message -> :ok end) # <= 4
    ...

It’s important to note that we defined the mocked function with expected values in the above code. We expect our test to subscribe to a specific topic and broadcast to the other(#1). We are also expecting that process will place an order at the exact values that we calculated upfront. This way, our mock becomes an integral part of the test, asserting that the correct values will be passed to other parts of the system(dependencies of the Naive.Trader module).

Another “trick”(#3) that we can use in our mocks is to leverage the fact that we can send a message to the test process from within the mocked function. We will leverage this idea to know precisely when the trader process finished its work as the notify/1 is the last function call inside the process’ callback(handle_info/2 inside the Naive.Trader module). We will assert that we should receive the message, and the test will be waiting for it before exiting(the default timeout is 100ms) instead of using hardcoded sleep to “hack” it to work.

The final part(#4) tells the mox package that Logger.info/1 will be called twice inside the test. The mox will verify the number of calls to the mocked function and error if it doesn’t much the expected amount.

The second part of the test is preparing the initial state for the Naive.Trader process, generating trade event and sending it to the process:

# /apps/naive/test/naive/trader_test.exs
  ...
  test "Placing buy order test" do
    ...
    trader_state = dummy_trader_state()
    trade_event = generate_event(1, "0.43183010", "213.10000000")

    {:ok, trader_pid} = Naive.Trader.start_link(trader_state)
    send(trader_pid, trade_event)
    assert_receive :ok
  end

As described above, the assert_receive/1 function will cause the test to wait for the message for 100ms before quitting.

Here are the helper functions that we used to generate the initial trader state and trade event:

# /apps/naive/test/naive/trader_test.exs
  ...
  test "Placing buy order test" do
    ...
  end

  defp dummy_trader_state() do
    %Naive.Trader.State{
      id: 100_000_000,
      symbol: "XRPUSDT",
      budget: "200",
      buy_order: nil,
      sell_order: nil,
      buy_down_interval: Decimal.new("0.0025"),
      profit_interval: Decimal.new("0.001"),
      rebuy_interval: Decimal.new("0.006"),
      rebuy_notified: false,
      tick_size: "0.0001",
      step_size: "0.001"
    }
  end

  defp generate_event(id, price, quantity) do
    %Core.Struct.TradeEvent{
      event_type: "trade",
      event_time: 1_000 + id * 10,
      symbol: "XRPUSDT",
      trade_id: 2_000 + id * 10,
      price: price,
      quantity: quantity,
      buyer_order_id: 3_000 + id * 10,
      seller_order_id: 4_000 + id * 10,
      trade_time: 5_000 + id * 10,
      buyer_market_maker: false
    }
  end

The above code finishes the implementation of the test, but inside it, we used functions from the BinanceMock module that are private. We need to update the module by making the generate_fake_order/4 and
convert_order_to_order_response/1 function public(and moving them up in the module, so they are next to other public functions):

# /apps/binance_mock/lib/binance_mock.ex
  ...
  def get_order(symbol, time, order_id) do
    ...
  end

  def generate_fake_order(symbol, quantity, price, side) # <= updated to public
    ...
  end

  def convert_order_to_order_response(%Binance.Order{} = order) do # <= updated to public
    ...
  end
...

We updated both of the methods to public and moved them up after the get_order/3 function.

17.6 Define an alias to run unit tests

Our unit test should be run without running the whole application, so we need to run them with the --no-start argument. We should also select unit tests by tag(--only unit). Let’s create an alias that will hide those details:

# /mix.exs
  defp aliases do
    [
      ...
      "test.unit": [
        "test --only unit --no-start"
      ]
    ]
  end

We can now run our test using a terminal:

MIX_ENV=test mix test.unit

We should see the following error:

21:22:03.811 [error] GenServer #PID<0.641.0> terminating
** (stop) exited in: GenServer.call(BinanceMock, :generate_id, 5000)
    ** (EXIT) no process: the process is not alive or there's no process currently
       associated with the given name, possibly because its application isn't started

One of the BinanceMock module’s functions is sending a message to generate a unique id to the process that doesn’t exist(as we are running our tests without starting the supervision tree[the --no-start argument]).

There are two ways to handle this issue:

  • inside the /apps/naive/test/test_helper.exs file we could ensure that the BinanceMock is up and running by adding Application.ensure_all_started(:binance_mock) function call - this is a hack
  • we could refactor the BinanceMock.generate_fake_order/4 to accept order_id as an argument instead of sending the message internally - this should be a much better solution. Let’s give it a shot.

First, let’s update the BinanceMock module:

# /apps/binance_mock/lib/binance_mock.ex
  def generate_fake_order(order_id, symbol, quantity, price, side) # <= order_id added
    ...
    # remove the call to GenServer from the body
    ...
  end
  ...
  defp order_limit(symbol, quantity, price, side) do
    ...
      generate_fake_order(
        GenServer.call(__MODULE__, :generate_id), # <= order_id generation added
        symbol,
        quantity,
        price,
        side
      )

Now we need to update our test to pass some dummy order id from the mocked function:

# /apps/naive/test/naive/trader_test.exs
  ...
  test "Placing buy order test" do
    ...
      {:ok, BinanceMock.generate_fake_order(
        "12345",                        # <= order_id added
        "XRPUSDT",
        "464.360",
        "0.4307",
        "BUY"
      )
   ...
  end

We can now rerun our test:

MIX_ENV=test mix test.unit
...
Finished in 0.1 seconds (0.00s async, 0.1s sync)
2 tests, 0 failures, 1 excluded

Congrats! We just successfully tested placing an order without any dependencies. To avoid explicitly passing the MIX_ENV=test environment variable, we will add the preferred environment for our alias inside the mix.exs file:

# /mix.exs
  def project do
    [
      ...
      preferred_cli_env: [
        "test.unit": :test
      ]
  end

Now we can run our tests by:

mix test.unit
...
Finished in 0.06 seconds (0.00s async, 0.06s sync)
2 tests, 0 failures, 1 excluded

That’s all for this chapter - to sum up, the main advantages from the mox based tests:

  • we were able to test a standalone process/module ignoring all of its dependencies
  • we were able to confirm that dependent functions were called and expected values were passed to them
  • we were able to create a feedback loop where mock was sending a message back to the test, because of which, we didn’t need to use sleep, and that resulted in a massive speed gains

[Note] Please remember to run the mix format to keep things nice and tidy.

The source code for this chapter can be found on GitHub