environment configuration for tests running in NUnit

Question

I have some integration tests that hit a webserver and verify certain functionalities. Depending on the build environment, the server will be at a different address (http://localhost:8080/, http://test-vm/, etc). I would like to run these tests from a TFS build.

I'm wondering whats the appropriate way to configure these tests? Would I just add a setting to the config file? I'm doing that currently. Incidentally we do have a separate branch per test environment, so I could have a different config file checked in for each environment. I wonder if there is a better way though?

I'd like the build project to be able to tell the test what server to test. This seems better because then I don't have to maintain config information on a per branch basis.

I believe I'd be using NUnit for Team Build (http://nunit4teambuild.codeplex.com/) to get NUnit/TFS to play together.

Answer 1

I can think of a couple options:

• Edit the .config file via command line before the test runs.
• If the setting depends on which machine the test is run from, you could put it in machine.config