Pact Example

This is an example project to give an overview about Consumer Driven Contract Testing.

Prolog
- Effective test suites with short feedback loop
- The problem with E2E integration testing
Intro to Consumer Driven Contract Testing
What?
Intro to Pact
Helpful links

Prolog

When setting up a continuous deployment pipeline for any project, having a purposeful testing plan is of utmost importance.

Effective test suites with short feedback loop

An effective test suite includes a combination of testing strategies that leads to high test coverage, that in turn drives confidence. These strategies are typically in the form of unit, component, integration and acceptance tests. Monitoring and alerting too.

The test suite needs to run wicked fast, and be reliable. This cannot be stressed enough. If tests are flakey (i.e. often return false negatives or positives) it cannot be depended on to give us the desired confidence that we need.

Tests also need to run as early as possible in the continuous deployment pipeline to shorten the feedback loop for the developer. So ideally, most tests should be designed to run when pull requests are built (on standalone build agents that are sandboxed from the application environment). To achieve this requirement, tests must make no assumption about the availability of any of its external dependencies, and be designed to run in isolation.

Tests that are designed to be fast, reliable and isolate failure will have a short and effective feedback loop that informs the developer with confidence whether the product is working or not.

The problem with E2E integration testing

Unit tests is a good example of one such testing process that achieves the desired effectiveness being aspired to — they are fast, reliable and isolate failure. However, unit tests on their own are not enough because they give no guarantee that the tested units work well together.

In the absence of the perfect unit test suite, end-to-end (E2E) integration tests are typically the testing strategy of choice that is used to try and ascertain confidence in the system working as a whole.

Even though E2E tests are full of promise to assert the overall product working a whole from a user’s perspective, they quickly become a very bad idea because of their awful feedback loop — slow, unreliable and depend on too many things at once.

Intro to Consumer Driven Contract Testing

An alternative testing strategy that complements the deficiency of unit tests but verifies that components with external dependencies work together is integration contract testing. The concept isn’t new, but with the mainstream acceptance of microservices, it's important to remind people that consumer-driven contracts are an essential part of a mature microservice testing portfolio, enabling independent service deployments.

When two independently developed services are collaborating, changes to the supplier’s API can cause failures for all its consumers. Consuming services usually cannot test against live suppliers since such tests are slow and brittle, so it’s best to use Test Doubles (mocks), leading to the danger that the test doubles get out of sync with the real supplier service. Consumer teams can protect themselves from these failures by using integration contract tests – tests that compare actual service responses with test values. While such contract tests are valuable, they are even more useful when consuming services provide these tests to the supplier, who can then run all their consumers’ contract tests to determine if their changes are likely to cause problems.

Contract testing is immediately applicable anywhere where you have two services that need to communicate - such as an API client and a web front-end or for instance to services communicating via messaging queues. Although a single client and a single service is a common use case, contract testing really shines in an environment with many services (as common for a microservice architecture). Having well-formed contract tests makes it easy for developers to avoid version hell. Contract testing is the killer app for microservice development and deployment.

In general, a contract is between a consumer (for instance a client that wants to receive some data) and a provider (for instance an API on a server that provides the data the client needs). In microservice architectures, the traditional terms client and server are not always appropriate -- for example, when communication is achieved through message queues (we'll have a look at this as well).

Benefits in short

enable services to be deployed independently
enables teams to work independently from each other
enables verification of external endpoints - am i building what is wanted?

Intro to Pact

Pact is a consumer-driven contract testing tool. This means the contract is written as part of the consumer tests. A major advantage of this pattern is that only parts of the communication that are actually used by the consumer(s) get tested. This in turn means that any provider behaviour not used by current consumers is free to change without breaking tests.

Pact enables consumer driven contract testing, providing a mock service and DSL for the consumer project, interaction playback and verification for the service provider project.

The Pact family of testing frameworks (Pact-JVM, Pact Ruby, Pact .NET, Pact Go, Pact.js, Pact Swift etc.) provide support for Consumer Driven Contract Testing between dependent systems where the integration is based on HTTP (or message queues for some of the implementations).

the motivation of this example implementations

Because Pact is supporting so much languages and different ways of doing things and they have a distributed documentation it can get messy and a bit annoying to search or better say filter for the information you particularly want / need. Only for the JVM there are currently ~20 different extensions / dependencies (plugins not included). 🤯

In my opinion it's absolutely awesome to get decent support for different languages and frameworks, but it can become quite hard to keep track of all the already existing stuff (especially if you're a newbie to Pact).

For this reason I decided to write a compact step by step guide with working examples using Maven as build tool and provide each a Kotlin and a Java example of the test implementation. (😏 and a Javascript Consumer implementation)

What?

What's going on here (in short):

Test implementation examples:
- Consumer: Kotlin, Java, Javascript
- Producer: Kotlin and Java
Contract repository: Pact Broker
- via docker-compose
Functional API tests: WireMock
Build-tool: Maven

Included examples are: How to test services that are talking REST as well as examples regarding how to ensure your services that are communication via messaging providing data in the correct format (from the consumers point of view).

The REST-Example includes two applications where one is acting as a producer (webservice with rest endpoint) and a consumer (a CLI app that prints data received from the producer to console if executed).

Both of the applications (producer and consumer) are testing there-self. The Consumer-Apps dependencies (having the Producer-App available, a working internet connection and getting a suitable response) can be detached by mocking (e.g. WireMock) to run locally and independent. Great!!! so far so good. We want go a step further and decouple the release cycles of our microservices.

But how to make sure the Producers (supplier) response is in a Suitable format for the Consumer?

🤝 In a good relationship we know what to expect from each other and so should our services do.

Let's make a Pact

What is a Pact? 🤷‍

A formal agreement between individuals or parties. Synonyms: agreement, protocol, deal, contract

~ Oxford Dictionaries

In Terms of Contract Testing you should always proceed according to the following schema when implementing a Pact:

Start implementing on the Consumer side
- define your contract
- verify your contract against a mock
- publish your contract
End up verifying the contract on Producer side

A few words in advance:

Don't get confused by the Consumer / Producer wording - it is not related to the data flow! Producer in the context of Pact describes who is providing the API. That means for instance if you make a POST-request to an API - the API providing application is the Producer, where the application that is doing the request is the Consumer on the other hand.

Regarding the example implementations we will focus on the HTTP based integration first and later on we having a look at messaging queues.

REST Example (Server to Server communication)

The Consuming Application

Defining a Pact

Defining a Pact should be splitted into 3 steps:

Define
Test
Publish

If you are looking for an example on how to define a contract by using Javascript go here.

Define

We'll start defining our Pact at the Consumer Application. I mean hey, we want to work Consumer Driven and who could know its requirements regarding a producer API better then the Consumer itself?

prerequisites on consumer side

First let's add the relevant Pact dependency for our use-case to the consumer applications pom.xml. I'm using the pact-jvm-consumer-java8 dependency here (an extension for the pact DSL provided by pact-jvm-consumer) because it provides a nice lambda based DSL for use with Junit to build consumer tests.

<dependency>
	<groupId>au.com.dius</groupId>
	<artifactId>pact-jvm-consumer-java8_2.12</artifactId>
	<version>3.5.21</version>
	<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

Now we are able to define how the Producer APIs response needs to look like from the Consumers point of view. We'll begin by creating a test class named ContractTest that implements ConsumerPactTestMk2.

You'll need to implement providerName(), consumerName(), createPact() and runTest().

The implementation of the providerName() method should return a string that describes the name of the provider API. Since our Provider is responsible for user data we should call it something like "user-data-provider":

using kotlin

override fun providerName(): String = "user-data-provider"

using java

@Override
protected String providerName() {
  return "user-data-provider";
}

The implementation of the consumerName() method should return a string that describes the name of the consuming service. Since our Consumer is an cli-tool that displays user data we should call it something like "user-data-cli":

using kotlin

override fun consumerName(): String = "user-data-cli"

using java

@Override
protected String consumerName() {
  return "user-data-cli";
}

Hint: Don't test (worst-case scenario) all fields or HTTP status codes the Provider API supports with Pact. You don't want to break the Providers build on every change that's made over there (for instance if something changed that wouldn't influence the behavior on Consumer Apps side). Just be tide on the things the Consumer App really expects from the Provider API.

Take away: To verify how your Producer Client behaves on scenarios like network errors or getting crappy data from the API you should use WireMock.

Now let's define how a request from the Consumer looks like and what's the expected format of the payload by implementing the createPact() method.

We are using the PactDslWithProvider builder to describe the request and (because we are expecting a response with a JSON body) the PactDslJsonBody builder to define the payload:

using kotlin:

override fun createPact(builder: PactDslWithProvider): RequestResponsePact {

  val body = PactDslJsonBody()
  		.stringType("firstName")
  		.stringType("lastName")
  		.numberType("age")
  		.`object`("ids", PactDslJsonBody()
  				.integerType("id")
  				.uuid("uuid"))

  return builder.uponReceiving("can get user data from user data provider")
  		.path("/user")
  		.willRespondWith()
  		.status(200)
  		.body(body)
  		.toPact()
}

using java:

@Override
protected RequestResponsePact createPact(PactDslWithProvider builder) {
  PactDslJsonBody body = new PactDslJsonBody()
  		.stringType("firstName")
  		.stringType("lastName")
  		.numberType("age")
  		.object("ids", new PactDslJsonBody()
  			.integerType("id")
  			.uuid("uuid")
  		);

  return builder.uponReceiving("can get user data from user data provider")
  		.path("/user")
  		.method("GET")
  		.willRespondWith()
  		.status(200)
  		.body(body)
  		.toPact();
}

Test

At this point we should define our client-side test based on the defined request we described in the step before. So let our UserClient (that is talking to the Provider) call a mockServer (that is created for us by Pact) as we defined it in our createPact() implementation.

using kotlin:

override fun runTest(mockServer: MockServer) {
  val expectedKeys = listOf("firstName", "lastName", "ids", "age")
  val result = UserClient("${mockServer.getUrl()}/user").callProducer()
  assertThat(result.keys).containsAll(expectedKeys)
}

using java:

@Override
protected void runTest(MockServer mockServer) {
   List<String> expectedKeys = Arrays.asList("firstName", "lastName", "ids", "age");
   Map<String, String> result = new UserClient(mockServer.getUrl() + "/user").callProducer();
   assertThat(result.keySet()).containsAll(expectedKeys);
}

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Kotlin afterwards.

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Java afterwards.

At this point we already achieved a lot. We verified our UserClient is working correctly and we created the contract definition - or better said, Pact generated one for us :) - our Provider will validate his Api against later on. You can have a look at it under /target/pacts/user-data-cli-user-data-provider.json (it should look similar to THIS one).

Publish

The Broker

Sharing is caring - In this Example we are using a broker to host our contracts. For showcasing reasons we just start the Pact-Broker and a postgres database via docker-compose. In a real world scenario you probably want to run the broker permanently on a VM - so you should deploy it somewhere. But because this example is focusing on Pact itself we'll proceed using docker to quickly get a running Pact broker.

The Pact Broker provides a repository for consumer driven contracts that:

tells you which versions of your applications can be deployed safely together
solves the problem of how to share pacts between consumer and provider projects
allows you to decouple your service release cycles
provides API documentation that is guaranteed to be up-to date
shows you real examples of how your services interact
allows you to visualise the relationships between your services
can integrate with other systems, such as Slack or your CI server, via webhooks

Broker Setup with docker-compose

To archive a running Pact-Broker via docker-compose we put a file called docker-compose.yml in the root of our project.

version: '3'

services:

  postgres:
    image: postgres
    healthcheck:
      test: psql postgres --command "select 1" -U postgres
    ports:
      - "5432:5432"
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: postgres
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: password
      POSTGRES_DB: postgres

  broker_app:
    image: dius/pact-broker
    ports:
      - "80:80"
    links:
      - postgres
    environment:
      PACT_BROKER_DATABASE_USERNAME: postgres
      PACT_BROKER_DATABASE_PASSWORD: password
      PACT_BROKER_DATABASE_HOST: postgres
      PACT_BROKER_DATABASE_NAME: postgres
      PACT_BROKER_LOG_LEVEL: DEBUG

Afterwards run:

$ docker-compose up

Troubleshooting on Mac/Windows: I get a "initdb: could not create directory "/var/lib/postgresql/data/pg_wal": No space left on device" error

Your docker VM has probably run out of disk space.

Try deleting some old images. (docker rmi -f $(docker images -a -q))

check your docker config and increase its disk image size

Thereby we achieved to have a Pact-Broker running (on port 80). To verify everything went well just open http://localhost in your browser. You should see the Pact-Broker UI but no uploaded contract for now.

Upload contract to broker

To upload the Contract add the following plugin to the consumers pom.xml

<plugin>
	<groupId>au.com.dius</groupId>
	<artifactId>pact-jvm-provider-maven_2.12</artifactId>
	<version>3.5.11</version>
	<configuration>
		<pactBrokerUrl>http://localhost:80</pactBrokerUrl>
		<projectVersion>${project.version}</projectVersion>
		<trimSnapshot>true</trimSnapshot>
	</configuration>
</plugin>

Afterwards you are able to upload your contract to the broker by executing the following command:

$ mvn verify pact:publish

If everything went well you should see your contract in the Pact-Broker UI.

In a real world project you should think about a suitable way to execute this command within your build chain - for instance everytime the Producer client implementation has changed on the consumer side.

Best Practices (on Consumer side)

Use Pact for contract testing, not functional testing of the provider!!! (read more here and here)
Use Pact for isolated (unit) tests (read more...)
Think carefully about how you use it for non-isolated tests (functional, integration tests) (read more...)
Always make sure you made the latest pact available to the Provider!
Ensure all calls to the Provider go through classes that have been tested with Pact. (read more...)

The Providing Application

(the Producer)

Verify a Pact

Now that we have a Contract defined by the Consumer our Provider have to verify it. On the Provider side this test should always be executed in your build-chain to make sure you are not breaking things on Consumers side. In contrast to the consumer tests, provider verification is entirely driven by the Pact framework (there's nothing better than things getting simple ❤️).

Verify

prerequisites on Producer side

In our case, we want to start our Spring-Boot-based Producer app and have the Pact being checked against it. This is why we are going to use pact-jvm-provider-spring_2.12 package because it is bringing some really handy annotations into the game - you'll see what i mean in just a minute.

<dependency>
	<groupId>au.com.dius</groupId>
	<artifactId>pact-jvm-provider-spring_2.12</artifactId>
	<version>3.5.23</version>
</dependency>

if you're not using Spring you should have a look here: junit-provider

if you're not using jUnit4 or jUnit5 you should have a look here: maven-provider

if you're using gradle instead of maven you should have a look here: gradle-provider

Verification Test

The second step of our contract verification is creating a test for the Producer using a mock client based on the contract. Our provider implementation will be driven by this contract in TDD fashion. The Test implementation on the Producer side is pretty straight forward.

using kotlin:

@RunWith(SpringRestPactRunner::class)
@Provider("user-data-provider")
@PactBroker(protocol = "http", host = "localhost", port = "80")
@SpringBootTest(webEnvironment = SpringBootTest.WebEnvironment.RANDOM_PORT)

class UserDataProviderContractIT {
   @TestTarget
   @JvmField
   final val target: Target = SpringBootHttpTarget()
}

using java:

@RunWith(SpringRestPactRunner.class)
@Provider("user-data-provider")
@PactBroker(protocol = "http", host = "localhost", port = "80")
@SpringBootTest(webEnvironment = SpringBootTest.WebEnvironment.RANDOM_PORT)
public class JavaUserDataProviderContractIT {

   @TestTarget
   public final Target target = new SpringBootHttpTarget();
}

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Kotlin.

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Java.

In order to get the contract verification results replayed to the Pact-Broker it's necessary to set the property pact.verifier.publishResults=true. This can rather be done by setting the property via the failsafe-plugin (which we use to run our integration tests) like so:

<plugin>
	<groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
	<artifactId>maven-failsafe-plugin</artifactId>
	<configuration>
		<systemPropertyVariables>
			<pact.verifier.publishResults>true</pact.verifier.publishResults>
			<pact.provider.version>${project.version}</pact.provider.version>
		</systemPropertyVariables>
	</configuration>
</plugin>

Or by setting the property programmatically:

val props = System.getProperties()
props.put("pact.verifier.publishResults", "true")
System.setProperties(props)

If you run your tests and set the system property you should see a verified contract in the Pact-Broker UI.

A nice Pact-Broker feature in my opinion is the network graph that shows which services have dependencies to each other or let's better say which of them assure they there compatibility by having a Pact. 🤗

When clicking on an arrow in the graph you'll see a detailed view describing the exact properties a certain consumer relies on regarding the producers API. Which is really great from Producers point of view to know it's consumers and furthermore what data they are consuming in detail.

Best Practices (on Producers side)

Ensure that the latest pact is being verified (read more...)
Ensure that Pact verify runs as part of your CI build

Javascript Consumer

As already mentioned Pact is supporting a bunch of languages. A very handy combination i saw in real world projects is defining a contract between a pure javascript based consumer (for instance a node.js app) doing ajax-requests against some backend server providing an API.

In this example a basic React app with Jest as testing platform is assumed. Your project structure could look as follows.

Prerequisites

First let's add the pact and pact-node dev dependency to the consumer applications package.json.

The pact-node dependency is needed to publish your pact file to the broker. This could also be solved by using the pact maven or gradle plugin (depending on your build setup). But to keep the JS example a pure JS example i decided to go the pact-node way here.

"devDependencies": {
    "@pact-foundation/pact": "7.0.3",
    "@pact-foundation/pact-node": "6.20.0"
}

Define

Now we are able to define how the Producer APIs response needs to look like from the Consumers point of view.

Configure

First of all we want Pact to to create a mock server for us, tell pact who is the consumer and the provider and where to place generated pact files.

import { Pact } from "@pact-foundation/pact";

const pact = new Pact({
		consumer: "user-data-ui",
		provider: "user-data-provider",
		port: 4711,
		log: path.resolve(process.cwd(), "dist/logs", "pact.log"),
		dir: path.resolve(process.cwd(), "dist/pacts"),
		logLevel: "WARN",
		spec: 2, // <-- it's important to use the same pact spec verion as the producer here
		cors: true
	});
}

Troubleshooting for Jest I get a "SecurityError: localStorage is not available for opaque origins" error when executing tests

The root cause is often libraries looping over all jsdom properties and adding them to the global; even if you never use localStorage in your tests, some library or test framework you are depending on is "using" it in this manner. Note that this looping-and-copying technique is explicitly unsupported by jsdom.

jest issue

jsdom issue

To fix this you can set env config for non-browser environment by adding the following at the top of your test class:
/**
* @jest-environment node
*/

Hint: Don't test (worst-case scenario) all fields or HTTP status codes the Provider API supports with Pact. You don't want to break the Providers build on every change that's made over there (for instance if something changed that wouldn't influence the behavior on Consumer Apps side). Just be tide on the things the Consumer App really expects from the Provider API.

Take away: To verify how your Producer Client behaves on scenarios like network errors or getting crappy data from the API you should use WireMock.

Configure Mock Server

Now let's define how a request from the Consumer looks like and what's the expected format of the payload.

import { Matchers } from "@pact-foundation/pact";

beforeEach((done) => 
	pact.setup()
		.then(() => {
			// define expected response
			const expectedResponse = {
				firstName: Matchers.like("aValidFirstName"),
				lastName: Matchers.like("aValidLastName"),
				age: Matchers.integer(100)
			};
	
			// define request
			return pact.addInteraction({
				state: "some user available",
	
				uponReceiving: "a user request",
	
				withRequest: {
					method: "GET",
					path: "/user",
	
					headers: {
						Accept: Matchers.term({
							matcher: "application/json",
							generate: "application/json"
						})
					},
				},
	
				willRespondWith: {
					status: 200,
					headers: {"Content-Type": "application/json;charset=UTF-8"},
					body: expectedResponse
				}
			});
		})
		.then(() => done())
	);

Test

At this point we should define our client-side test based on the defined request we described in the step before. So let our UserClient (that is talking to the Provider) call the mockServer (that was created for us by Pact) as we defined it in our consumer test and validate our expected response.

it("can load user data", () => {

	expect.assertions(3);

	const url = `http://localhost:4711/user`;

	const promise = fetchUserData(url);

	return promise.then(response => {
		expect(response.status).toBe(200);
		expect(response.headers['content-type']).toBe("application/json;charset=UTF-8");
		expect(response.data).toMatchObject({
			firstName: "aValidFirstName",
			lastName: "aValidLastName",
			age: 100
		});
	});
});

create pact file

Don't forget to create the Pact file(s) after a successful test run.

afterAll(() => {
	pact.finalize();
});

Publish

Now that we have successfully generated a Pact file (you'll find it in your build dir if everything went well) we want to upload it to the Pact Broker. Generally should be solved via a build step that should be executed when your tests are running on your CI system, but for demo purpose i'm going to upload it by calling publishContract() whenever the pact test succeeded.

import { Publisher } from "@pact-foundation/pact-node";

const publishContract = () => {

	const options = {
		pactFilesOrDirs: [path.resolve(process.cwd(), "dist/pacts")],
		pactBroker: "http://localhost:80",
		consumerVersion: "0.1.0"
	};

	new Publisher(options).publish();
};

So your test class should look something like THIS

Having a look at Pact-Broker UI you should see something like:

make your Provider Test work

When verifying a contract created by a Javascript consumer it is necessary to the following to your Producers Pact verification test.

using Kotlin:

@State("some user available")
fun userAvailable() {}

using Java:

@State("some user available")
public void userAvailable() {}

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Kotlin.

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Java.

Having a look at Pact-Broker UI you should see something like:

When clicking on an arrow in the Pact-Brokers network graph overview you'll see a detailed view describing the exact properties a certain consumer relies on regarding the producers API. Which is really great from Producers point of view to know it's consumers and furthermore what data they are consuming in detail.

Spring Cloud Contract meets Pact

So far we saw different possibilities on doing consumer driven contract testing using Pact. But on the one hand you don't always know your consumers (until they wrote a contract test) and on the other hand it's not nice to dictate a library or framework to your consumers. Assuming every application (including the maintainers) has to work with a certain tool doesn't sounds like a good idea regarding independent and autonomously working teams. Now the good news, Spring-Cloud-Contract has support for Pact by generating Pact-Files if wanted, which can of course be published to a Pact broker.

The Consumer

more coming soon ...

The Provider

First let's add the Spring Cloud Contract maven plugin and set it up to use our Pact Broker as its Contract repository.

<plugin>
	<groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
	<artifactId>spring-cloud-contract-maven-plugin</artifactId>
	<version>2.0.2.RELEASE</version>
	<extensions>true</extensions>
	<configuration>
		<contractsRepositoryUrl>pact://http://localhost:80</contractsRepositoryUrl>

		<!-- We reuse the contract dependency section to set up the path
		to the folder that contains the contract definitions. In our case the
		path will be /groupId/artifactId/version/contracts -->
		<contractDependency>
			<groupId>${project.groupId}</groupId>
			<artifactId>${project.artifactId}</artifactId>
			<!-- When + is passed, a latest tag will be applied when fetching pacts -->
			<version>+</version>
		</contractDependency>

		<!-- The contracts mode can't be classpath -->
		<contractsMode>REMOTE</contractsMode>
	</configuration>
	<!-- Don't forget to add spring-cloud-contract-pact to the classpath! -->
	<dependencies>
		<dependency>
			<groupId>org.springframework.cloud</groupId>
			<artifactId>spring-cloud-contract-pact</artifactId>
			<version>2.0.2.RELEASE</version>
		</dependency>
	</dependencies>
</plugin>

more coming soon ...

Messaging Example

This is basically working the exact same way as our REST-example. How does that make sense? It's because of Pact is not going to start a Kafka, ActiveMQ or whatever mock. When talking about consumer driven contract tests with Pact and messaging it's about to make sure you can deserialize an events payload - describe how the messages have to look like for your consumer.

Let's start by defining our contract on the Consumer side again

prerequisites

First let's add the relevant Pact dependency to the consumer applications pom.xml.

<dependency>
	<groupId>au.com.dius</groupId>
	<artifactId>pact-jvm-consumer-java8_2.12</artifactId>
	<version>3.5.21</version>
	<scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

The Consumer

You'll find a working example in MessagingContractTest class. More documentation coming soon ...

The Provider

more coming soon ...

Extra infos on Pact

Terminology

Service Consumer

A component that initiates a HTTP request to another component (the service provider). Note that this does not depend on the way the data flows - whether it is a GET or a PUT / POST / PATCH / DELETE, the consumer is the initiator of the HTTP request.

Service Provider

A server that responds to an HTTP request from another component (the service consumer). A service provider may have one or more HTTP endpoints, and should be thought of as the "deployable unit" - endpoints that get deployed together should be considered part of the same provider.

Mock Service Provider

Used by tests in the consumer project to mock out the actual service provider, meaning that integration-like tests can be run without requiring the actual service provider to be available.

Interaction

A request and response pair. A pact consists of a collection of interactions.

Pact file

A file containing the JSON serialised interactions (requests and responses) that were defined in the consumer tests. This is the Contract. A Pact defines:

the consumer name
the provider name
a collection of interactions
the pact specification version (see below)

Pact verification

To verify a Pact contract, the requests contained in a Pact file are replayed against the provider code, and the responses returned are checked to ensure they match those expected in the Pact file.

Provider state

A name describing a “state” (like a fixture) that the provider should be in when a given request is replayed against it - e.g. “when user John Doe exists” or “when user John Doe has a bank account”. These allow the same endpoint to be tested under different scenarios.

A provider state name is specified when writing the consumer specs, then, when the pact verification is set up in the provider the same name will be used to identify the set up code block that should be run before the request is executed.

Pact Specification

The Pact Specification is a document that governs the structure of the actual generated Pact files to allow for interoperability between languages (consider, for example, a JavaScript consumer connecting to a Scala JVM-based provider) , using semantic versioning to indicate breaking changes.

Each language implementation of Pact needs to implement the rules of this specification, and advertise which version(s) are supported, corresponding closely to which features are available.

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Pact Example

Table of Contents

Prolog

Effective test suites with short feedback loop

The problem with E2E integration testing

Intro to Consumer Driven Contract Testing

Benefits in short

Intro to Pact

the motivation of this example implementations

What?

But how to make sure the Producers (supplier) response is in a Suitable format for the Consumer?

Let's make a Pact

REST Example (Server to Server communication)

The Consuming Application

Defining a Pact

Define

prerequisites on consumer side

Test

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Kotlin afterwards.

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Java afterwards.

Publish

The Broker

Broker Setup with docker-compose

Upload contract to broker

Best Practices (on Consumer side)

The Providing Application

(the Producer)

Verify a Pact

Verify

prerequisites on Producer side

Verification Test

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Kotlin.

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Java.

Best Practices (on Producers side)

Javascript Consumer

Prerequisites

Define

Configure

Configure Mock Server

Test

create pact file

Publish

So your test class should look something like THIS

make your Provider Test work

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Kotlin.

So your test class should look something like THIS if you are using Java.

Spring Cloud Contract meets Pact

The Consumer

The Provider

Messaging Example

prerequisites

The Consumer

The Provider

Extra infos on Pact

Terminology

Service Consumer

Service Provider

Mock Service Provider

Interaction

Pact file

Pact verification

Provider state

Pact Specification

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