Testing Kotlin with Spock Part 3 – Interface default method

Kotlin allows you to put method implementation in an interface. The same mechanism can be found in Java interfaces as default methods (and also Groovy or Scala traits). Let’s see the difference between the Kotlin and Java default methods in interface by testing it with Groovy and Spock.

What do we want to test?

We often have an interface for access object from the database. In domain, they might look similar to this KotlinOrderRepository:

interface KotlinOrderRepository {
    fun save(order: Order)

    fun find(orderId: OrderId): Order?

    fun get(orderId: OrderId): Order =
            find(orderId) ?: throw NotFound()
}

How to fake it with Groovy?

When we want to use such interface in tests, we can, of course, mock it. However, it is far better to fake repositories with a simple, in-memory implementation. Let’s create FakeKotlinOrderRepository in Groovy:

class FakeKotlinOrderRepository implements KotlinOrderRepository {
    private Map data = [:]

    @Override
    void save(Order order) {
        data[order.id] = order
    }

    @Override
    Order find(OrderId orderId) {
        return data[orderId]
    }
}

Unfortunately, this causes a compilation error

/testing-kotlin-in-spock/src/test/groovy/com/github/alien11689/testingkotlinwithspock/defaultmethod/FakeKotlinOrderRepository.groovy: 3: Can't have an abstract method in a non-abstract class. The class 'com.github.alien11689.testingkotlinwithspock.defaultmethod.FakeKotlinOrderRepository' must be declared abstract or the method 'com.github.alien11689.testingkotlinwithspock.defaultmethod.Order get(com.github.alien11689.testingkotlinwithspock.defaultmethod.OrderId)' must be implemented.
 @ line 3, column 1.
   class FakeKotlinOrderRepository implements KotlinOrderRepository {
   ^

1 error

The compiler doesn’t see the implementation of the get method in the Kotlin interface. We have to use some magic to make it work in groovy.

Solution

To solve the problem, let’s look into the generated classes:

$ ls build/classes/main/com/github/alien11689/testingkotlinwithspock/defaultmethod/
JavaOrderRepository.class
KotlinOrderRepository.class
KotlinOrderRepository$DefaultImpls.class
NotFound.class
Order.class
OrderId.class

The KotlinOrderRepository$DefaultImpls class is the one we’re looking for as we can use it in Groovy to implement the missing operation.

class FakeKotlinOrderRepository implements KotlinOrderRepository {

    // ...

    Order get(OrderId orderId) {
        return KotlinOrderRepository.DefaultImpls.get(this, orderId)
    }
}

Now the code compiles and tests pass:

class KotlinRepositoryWithDefaultMethodTest extends Specification {
    OrderId orderId = new OrderId(UUID.randomUUID() as String)
    Order order = new Order(orderId, 'data')
    KotlinOrderRepository kotlinOrderRepository = new FakeKotlinOrderRepository()

    def 'should get order from kotlin repository'() {
        given:
            kotlinOrderRepository.save(order)
        expect:
            kotlinOrderRepository.get(orderId) == order
    }

    def 'should throw NotFound when order does not exist in kotlin repository'() {
        when:
            kotlinOrderRepository.get(orderId)
        then:
            thrown(NotFound)
    }
}

Is there the same problem with Java?

Let’s have a quick look at how this works with Java interfaces. If we write a similar repository in Java:

public interface JavaOrderRepository {
    void save(Order order);

    Optional find(OrderId orderId);

    default Order get(OrderId orderId) {
        return find(orderId).orElseThrow(NotFound::new);
    }
}

and create a fake implementation in Groovy:

class FakeJavaOrderRepository implements JavaOrderRepository {
    private Map data = [:]

    @Override
    void save(Order order) {
        data[order.id] = order
    }

    @Override
    Optional find(OrderId orderId) {
        return Optional.ofNullable(data[orderId])
    }
}

there is no compilation error and the tests pass:

class JavaRepositoryWithDefaultMethodTest extends Specification {
    OrderId orderId = new OrderId(UUID.randomUUID() as String)
    Order order = new Order(orderId, 'data')
    JavaOrderRepository javaOrderRepository = new FakeJavaOrderRepository()

    def 'should get order from java repository'() {
        given:
            javaOrderRepository.save(order)
        expect:
            javaOrderRepository.get(orderId) == order
    }

    def 'should throw NotFound when order does not exist in java repository'() {
        when:
            javaOrderRepository.get(orderId)
        then:
            thrown(NotFound)
    }
}

Groovy can implement Java interfaces with the default methods without any problems.

Show me the code

Code is available here.

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Private fields and methods are not private in groovy

I used to code in Java before I met groovy. Like most of you, groovy attracted me with many enhancements. This was to my surprise to discover that method visibility in groovy is handled different than Java!

Consider this example:

class Person {
private String name
public String surname

private Person() {}

private String signature() { "${name?.substring(0, 1)}. $surname" }

public String toString() { "I am $name $surname" }
}

How is this class interpreted with Java?

  1. Person has private constructor that cannot be accessed
  2. Field "name" is private and cannot be accessed
  3. Method signature() is private and cannot be accessed

Let's see how groovy interpretes Person:

public static void main(String[] args) {
def person = new Person() // constructor is private - compilation error in Java
println(person.toString())

person.@name = 'Mike' // access name field directly - compilation error in Java
println(person.toString())

person.name = 'John' // there is a setter generated by groovy
println(person.toString())

person.@surname = 'Foo' // access surname field directly
println(person.toString())

person.surname = 'Bar' // access auto-generated setter
println(person.toString())

println(person.signature()) // call private method - compilation error in Java
}

I was really astonished by its output:

I am null null
I am Mike null
I am John null
I am John Foo
I am John Bar
J. Bar

As you can see, groovy does not follow visibility directives at all! It treats them as non-existing. Code compiles and executes fine. It's contrary to Java. In Java this code has several errors, pointed out in comments.

I've searched a bit on this topic and it seems that this behaviour is known since version 1.1 and there is a bug report on that: http://jira.codehaus.org/browse/GROOVY-1875. It is not resolved even with groovy 2 release. As Tim Yates mentioned in this Stackoverflow question: "It's not clear if it is a bug or by design". Groovy treats visibility keywords as a hint for a programmer.

I need to keep that lesson in mind next time I want to make some field or method private!