smoke_test: Check your testing function against common edge cases

In accumulate: Split-Apply-Combine with Dynamic Groups

Check your testing function against common edge cases

Description

Writing a testing function that works on any subset of records of a dataframe can be quite subtle. This function tries the testing function on a number of common (edge) cases that are easily overlooked. It is not a unit test: a smoke test will not tell you whether your output is correct. It only checks the output data type (must be TRUE or FALSE and reports if errors, warnings, or messages occur.

Usage

smoke_test(dat, test, verbose = FALSE, halt = TRUE)

Arguments

dat	an example dataset. For example the full dataset to be fed into accumulate or cumulate.
test	A testing function to be passed as argument to accumulate or cumulate.
verbose	[logical] If TRUE, all results (including passed tests) are printed. If FALSE only failed tests are printed.
halt	[logical] toggle stopping when an error is thrown

Value

NULL, invisibly. This function has as side-effect that test results are printed to screen.

Examples

dat <- data.frame(x = 1:5, y=(-2):2)
smoke_test(dat, function(d) y > 0)   #error: Y not found
smoke_test(dat, function(d) d$y > 0) # issue: output too long, not robust against NA
smoke_test(dat, function(d) sum(d$y > 0) > 2) # issue: not robust against NA
smoke_test(dat, function(d) sum(d$y > 0, na.rm=TRUE) > 2) # OK

accumulate documentation built on April 4, 2025, 2:13 a.m.