Using MSTest in an open source project

Question

A colleague and I are writing an application that we intend to go Open Source with and are trying to decide on a testing framework. Without integration of NUnit (one of us has resharper while the other does not) we are leaning toward MSTest. However, if the majority of people that work on opensource .net applications only have the express edition of Visual Studio, we may have to change our mind on that.

What version of VS do you use and would MSTest turn you off to an Open Source Project?

Answer 1

If your problem is integration with Visual Studio, try Gallio. It includes MbUnit, but its runner can run tests from other frameworks, like NUnit, xUnit, etc.

Answer 2

You may be able to use visual nunit to add an nunit test runner in VS. link I've never used it but it may be worth a shot.

Answer 3

I think that people who don't use windows will be knocked out of the project by the choice to use MSTest. Most other c# testing libraries are available in mono, which is what mac and linux users would be using.

I don't know how many cross-platform developers you are trying to attract, but if it's an issue then you need to consider Linux/Mac devs.

Answer 4

It would turn me off. See MSBuild, NAnt, NUnit, MSTest, and frustration (not written by me!) - I suspect a number of people feel that way. MSBuild seems like a poorly-done copy of NAnt (we use both), and MSTest likewise looks like Microsoft's usual "not invented here" answer to open source. While I realize that there are good business reasons for Microsoft to develop their own tools, those reasons don't apply to their customers.

There are plug-ins to use NUnit inside Visual Studio without ReSharper, or you can always configure it to run from the Tools menu.

If you don't like NUnit, please consider one of the other open source testing alternatives. See NUnit vs. MbUnit vs. MSTest vs. xUnit.net