Godot 4 Changes

These are changes to Godot that affect how GUT is used/implemented. There is more information about these changes and how GUT has been altered below.

  • setget has been replaced with a completely new syntax. More info at #380. Examples of the new way and the new assert_property method below.

  • connect has been significantly altered. The signal related asserts will likely change to use Callable parameters instead of strings. It is possible to use strings, so this may remain in some form. More info in #383.

  • yield has been replaced with await. yield_to, yield_for, and yield_frames have been deprecated, the new methods are wait_seconds, wait_frames and wait_for_signal. There are examples below and more info at #382.

  • Arrays are pass by reference now.

  • Dictionaries are compared by value now.

  • File and Directory have been replaced with FileAccess and DirAccess.

  • is no longer accepts a variable for a class. You must use is_instance_of instead.

What’s new/changed in GUT 9.0.0 for Godot 4.0

  • Any methods that were deprecated in GUT 7.x have been removed.

  • assert_setget no longer works (it now just fails with a message). assert_property has been altered to work with the new setter/getter syntax. assert_set_property, assert_readonly_property, and assert_property_with_backing_variable have been added.

  • To aid refactoring, assert_property and assert_property_with_backing_variable will warn if any “public accessors” are found for the property (‘get_’ and ‘set_’ methods).

  • assert_property now requires an instance instead of also working with a loaded objects.

  • Doubling strategy flags have been renamed to INCLUDE_NATIVE (was FULL) and SCRIPT_ONLY (was PARTIAL). The default is SCRIPT_ONLY. I wanted something more descriptive and less likely to be confused with partial doubles.

  • Added support for a skip_script test-script variable. This can be added to any test-script or inner-class causing GUT to skip running tests in that script. The script will be included in the “risky” count and appear in the summary as skipped. This was done to help porting tests to 4.0 but might stick around as a permanent feature.

var skip_script = 'The reason for skipping.  This will be printed in the output.'

  • The various yield_ methods have been deprecated but are still supported to make conversions easier. The new syntax for yield_to, yield_for, or yield_frames is:

await yield_to(signaler, 'the_signal_name', 5, 'optional message')
await yield_for(1.5, 'optional message')
await yield_frames(30, 'optional message')

  • The replacement methods for the various yield_ methods are wait_seconds, wait_frames, and wait_for_signal.

await wait_for_signal(signaler.the_signal, 5, 'optional message') # wait for signal or 5 seconds
await wait_seconds(1.5, 'optional message')
await wait_frames(30, 'optional message')

  • Doubling no longer supports paths to a script or scene. Load the script or scene first and pass that to double. See the “Doubling Changes” section for more details.

  • Doubling Inner Classes now requires you to call register_inner_classes first. See the “Doubling Changes” section for more details.

  • Comparing Dictionary/Arrays with assert_eq, assert_eq_deep, and the new assert_same and assert_not_same for comparing references. See Godot’s new is_same function for details on how assert_same works (it’s just an assertion wrapper around is_same). See the section “Comparing Dictionaries and Arrays” below for more details.

Comparing Dictionaries and Arrays

In Godot 3.x dictionaries were compared by reference and arrays were compared by value. In 4.0 both are compared by value. Godot 4.0 introduces the is_same method which (amongst other things) will compare dictionaries and arrays by reference.

GUT’s assert_eq and assert_ne changed to match Godot’s behavior. To compare by reference you can use the new assert_same or assert_not_same. This works with arrays and dictionaries. Review Godot’s documentation for is_same. When comparing dictionaries and arrays it is recommended that you use assert_eq_deep since it provides more detailed output than assert_eq.

The shallow compare functionality has been removed since it no longer applies. Shallow compares would compare the elements of an array or dictionary by value. In Godot 3.x this meant that dictionaries inside of arrays or dictionaries would be compared by reference and everything else would be compared by value. Since arrays and dictionaries are both compared by value now, shallow compares are no different (functionally) than deep compares. The following methods have been removed. Calling these methods will generate a failure and an error.

  • compare_shallow (causes failure and returns null which will likely result in a runtime error)

  • assert_eq_shallow

  • assert_ne_shallow

Final note: assert_eq does not use assert_eq_deep since assert_eq_deep compares each element of both arrays/dictionaries and provides detailed info about what is different. This can be slow for large arrays/dictionaries. Godot’s == operator uses a hashing function which is much faster but does not provide information about what is different in each array/dictionary. With assert_eq, assert_eq_deep, and assert_same (and their inverses) you have fine grained control over the type of comparison that is performed.

Doubling Changes

Doubling scripts and scenes

The double method no longer supports paths to scripts or scenes. You should load the script or scene first, and then pass that to double instead.

var MyScript = load('res://my_script.gd')
var dbl = double(MyScript).new()

If you pass a string then an error message will be printed and double will return null. This will most likely result in a runtime error when you attempt to instantiate your double.

'Invalid call. Nonexistent function 'new' in base 'Nil'.'

Doubling Inner Classes

The double method no longer supports strings for the path of the base script or a string of the name of the Inner Class. You must call register_inner_classes then pass the Inner Class to double. You only have to do this once, so it is best to call it in before_all or a pre-hook script. Registering multiple times does nothing. Failing to call register_inner_classes will result in a GUT error and a runtime error.

# Given that SomeScript contains the class InnerClass that you wish to to double:
var SomeScript = load('res://some_script.gd')

func before_all():
    register_inner_classes(SomeScript)

func test_foo():
    var dbl = double(SomeScript.InnerClass).new()

This approach was used to make tests cleaner and less susceptible to typos. If Godot adds meta data to inner classes that point back to the source script, then register_inner_classes can be removed later and no other changes will need to be made.

setget vs set: and get:

In godot 4.0 setget has been replaced with set(val): and get(): pseudo methods which make properties more concrete. This is a welcome change, but comes with a few caveats.

Here’s an example of usage:

var foo = 10:
    get():
        return foo
    set(val):
        foo = val

This means you no longer need to define methods for your accessors. Though you may still want to for organizational purposes.

One downside to this approach is that there is no way to set the foo without going through the accessor. Many times, internally, you will want to set a value for a property without going through the setter. This is still possible, but you have to make a backing variable.

var _foo = 10
var foo = 10:
    get():
        return _foo
    set(val):
        _foo = val
        foo_changed.emit()

With this approach you can set _foo internally in your class without triggering the foo_changed signal. When you see foo = anywhere in your code, it will be going through the accessor. When you see _foo = you are only setting the backing variable.

To test this new paradigm assert_setget has been removed. assert_property has changed to work with the new syntax. assert_property_with_backing_variable was added to validate the backing variable wiring. If you use assert_property_with_backing_variable it will verify that the property has accessors and will also look for a _<varname> variable with the same name and verify it is being set.

assert_property will generate a warning when it finds “public” accessors for these properties (get_foo, set_foo).

Implementation Changes

  • The Gut control has been removed. Adding a Gut node to a scene to run tests will no longer work. This control dates back to Godot 2.x days. With GUT 7.4.1 I believe the in-editor Gut Panel has enough features to discontinue using a Scene/Gut control to run tests.

  • The GUI for GUT has been simplified to reflect that it is no longer used to run tests, just display progress and output. It has also been decoupled from gut.gd. gut.gd is now a Node instead of a Control and all GUI logic has been removed. New signals have been added so that a GUI can be made without gut.gd having to know anything about it. As a result, GUT can now be run without a GUI if that ever becomes something we want to do.

  • Replaced the old yield_between_tests flag with paint_after. This property (initially set to .1s) tells GUT how long to wait before it pauses for 1 frame to allow for painting the screen. This value is checked after each test, so longer tests can still cause a delay in the painting of the screen. This has made the painting a little choppier but has cut down the time it takes to run tests (200 simple tests in 20 scripts dropped from 2+ seconds to .5 seconds to run). This feature is settable from the command line, .gutconfig.json, and GutPanel.

  • Doubling has changed significantly.