Gradle Cucumber runner

A gradle plugin for running Cucumber-JVM.

It utilises the Cucumber-JVM command line implementation and forwards every call to cucumber.api.cli.Main

Usage

Add the plugin to your project

plugins {
  id "se.thinkcode.cucumber-runner" version "0.0.11"
}

The complete, and updated, instructions are availabe at the plugin portal.

Then run Cucumber with the default settings

./gradlew cucumber

Configuration

Cucumber must know where your steps are implemented. Add an extension to your gradle build script.

cucumber {
    glue = 'classpath:se.thinkcode'
}

This will search for steps in the package se.thinkcode and any subpackages below it.

The complete list of options that can be set are these:

cucumber {
    threads = '4'
    glue = 'classpath:se.thinkcode'
    extraGlues = ['another.classpath', 'to.include']
    plugin = ['pretty']
    tags = ''
    name = ''
    dryRun = 'true'
    monochrome = 'please'
    strict = 'please'
    snippets = ''
    version = ''
    help = ''
    i18n = ''
    wip = ''
    shorten = ''

    featurePath = 'src/test/resources'
    main = 'cucumber.api.cli.Main'
}

The only setting with default values are

    featurePath = 'src/test/resources'
    main = 'cucumber.api.cli.Main'

Options

The options available can be listed with the command

./gradlew help --task cucumber

Single word options can be given to Cucumber with the syntax

./gradlew cucumber --i18n help

More complicated expressions should be quoted to be forwarded to Cucumber.

./gradlew cucumber --tags "not @wip"

Tags

An important part of running Cucumber is to be able to partition the execution using different tags.

Executing a single tag can be done like this:

./gradlew cucumber --tags @wip

(assuming that you have a tag for work in progress, wip)

Cucumber supports multiple tags to be executed at the same time. Or negating a tag so everything else is executed. Unfortunately, you can't stack tags. The solution is to put them into quotes like this:

./gradlew cucumber --tags "not @wip"

Doing so will forward the expression not @wip to the option -tags and finally to Cucumber.

Glues

Cucumber uses glue to locate where the step definitions are.

Specify them in the build file using glue as a string if you use one path and extraGlues as an array of strings if you need more than one path

glue = 'classpath:se.thinkcode'
extraGlues = ['another.classpath', 'to.include']

Or specify them as a command line option:

--glue "classpath:se.thinkcode"

OR

--glue "classpath:se.thinkcode, another.classpath, to.include"
# The string will be divided into an array with `,` as delimiter. Any whitespace around `,` will be removed. 

Plugins

Cucumber supports usage of multiple plugins at the same time.

Specify them as an array of strings in the build file

plugin = ['se.thinkcode.progress.ProgressPrinter', 'se.thinkcode.report.MultiSeamHtmlReport:./build/reports']

Or specify them as a command line option:

--plugin "se.thinkcode.progress.ProgressPrinter, se.thinkcode.report.MultiSeamHtmlReport:./build/reports"

The string will be divided into an array with , as delimiter. Any whitespace around , will be removed.

This will specify that two plugins will be used and there names are

• se.thinkcode.progress.ProgressPrinter
• se.thinkcode.report.MultiSeamHtmlReport:./build/reports

The se.thinkcode.report.MultiSeamHtmlReport:./build/reports plugin will be configured to use the directory ./build/reports.

Running features in parallel

Cucumber supports parallel execution if you specify the number of thread to use. This can be done in two ways

• An option whn running from a command line, ./gradlew cucumber --threads 4, this will run four parallel threads
• An extension, that is setting the value in your build.gradle file in the cucumber section.

When setting the value in the build script, you can't really know how many threads the build will have access to. Hardcoding a fixed number may not be your best option.

One way of specifying the number of threads to use is:

cucumber {
    threads = Runtime.runtime.availableProcessors().intdiv(2) ?: 1
}

This will use as many threads as possible while leaving resources for Gradle to execute.

Shortening the command line

To solve the issue on Windows where there is a command line's length limit, use the option --shorten. The plugin will shorten the command line by making a temporary file for the classpath

you can specify them in the build file like this:

cucumber {
    shorten = manifest
}

or via the command line:

--shorten manifest

there are two possible values:

• manifest, using a temporary manifest jar file to supply the classpath
• argfile, using @argFile to supply the classpath (Java 9+)

--junit

Cucumber support setting properties for junit from the command line. The option --junit is not supported.

If you have an example where you think you need it, please share the example nd the desired outcome. Maybe there should be support for --junit. If that is the case, it is possible that it will be implemented.

Getting help

./gradlew cucumber --cucumber-help=please

This will call Cucumber with the argument --help. Unfortunately, Gradle requires that each command line option is followed by a value. It is please above. However, it could be anything.

Trouble shooting

Java 8 is required

The plugin is build using Java 8 and gradle must be executed with Java 8 or newer.

The cucumber command executed

Execute Gradle with debug to see the command that will be executed.

The printout is verbose, search for Cucumber command to find the actual command executed.

Caveat

In order for Cucumber to have all test resources available, the cucumber task depends on the java plugin task check. This means that your unit tests will be executed before Cucumber is executed.

The Java plugin lifecycle is described in the Java plugin documentation.

Development

Development is described in development.md