How do you print in a Go test using the “testing” package?

Question

I'm running a test in Go with a statement to print something (i.e. for debugging of tests) but it's not printing anything.

func TestPrintSomething(t *testing.T) {
    fmt.Println("Say hi")
}

When I run go test on this file, this is the output:

ok      command-line-arguments  0.004s

The only way to really get it to print, as far as I know, is to print it via t.Error(), like so:

func TestPrintSomethingAgain(t *testing.T) {
    t.Error("Say hi")
}

Which outputs this:

Say hi
--- FAIL: TestPrintSomethingAgain (0.00 seconds)
    foo_test.go:35: Say hi
FAIL
FAIL    command-line-arguments  0.003s
gom:  exit status 1

I've Googled and looked through the manual but didn't find anything.

Answer 1

The structs testing.T and testing.B both have a .Log and .Logf method that sound to be what you are looking for. .Log and .Logf are similar to fmt.Print and fmt.Printf respectively.

See more details here: http://golang.org/pkg/testing/#pkg-index

fmt.X print statements do work inside tests, but you will find their output is probably not on screen where you expect to find it and, hence, why you should use the logging methods in testing.

If, as in your case, you want to see the logs for tests that are not failing, you have to provide go test the -v flag (v for verbosity). More details on testing flags can be found here: https://golang.org/cmd/go/#hdr-Testing_flags

Answer 2

For example,

package verbose

import (
    "fmt"
    "testing"
)

func TestPrintSomething(t *testing.T) {
    fmt.Println("Say hi")
    t.Log("Say bye")
}

---

go test -v
=== RUN TestPrintSomething
Say hi
--- PASS: TestPrintSomething (0.00 seconds)
    v_test.go:10: Say bye
PASS
ok      so/v    0.002s

---

Command go

Description of testing flags

-v
Verbose output: log all tests as they are run. Also print all
text from Log and Logf calls even if the test succeeds.

---

Package testing

func (*T) Log

func (c *T) Log(args ...interface{})

Log formats its arguments using default formatting, analogous to Println, and records the text in the error log. For tests, the text will be printed only if the test fails or the -test.v flag is set. For benchmarks, the text is always printed to avoid having performance depend on the value of the -test.v flag.

Answer 3

t.Log() will not show up until after the test is complete, so if you're trying to debug a test that is hanging or performing badly it seems you need to use fmt.

Yes: that was the case up to Go 1.13 (August 2019) included.

And that was followed in golang.org issue 24929

Consider the following (silly) automated tests:

func TestFoo(t *testing.T) {
    t.Parallel()

  for i := 0; i < 15; i++ {
        t.Logf("%d", i)
        time.Sleep(3 * time.Second)
    }
}

func TestBar(t *testing.T) {
    t.Parallel()

  for i := 0; i < 15; i++ {
        t.Logf("%d", i)
        time.Sleep(2 * time.Second)
    }
}

func TestBaz(t *testing.T) {
    t.Parallel()

  for i := 0; i < 15; i++ {
        t.Logf("%d", i)
        time.Sleep(1 * time.Second)
    }
}

If I run go test -v, I get no log output until all of TestFoo is done, then no output until all of TestBar is done, and again no more output until all of TestBaz is done.
This is fine if the tests are working, but if there is some sort of bug, there are a few cases where buffering log output is problematic:

• When iterating locally, I want to be able to make a change, run my tests, see what's happening in the logs immediately to understand what's going on, hit CTRL+C to shut the test down early if necessary, make another change, re-run the tests, and so on.
  If TestFoo is slow (e.g., it's an integration test), I get no log output until the very end of the test. This significantly slows down iteration.
• If TestFoo has a bug that causes it to hang and never complete, I'd get no log output whatsoever. In these cases, t.Log and t.Logf are of no use at all.
  This makes debugging very difficult.
• Moreover, not only do I get no log output, but if the test hangs too long, either the Go test timeout kills the test after 10 minutes, or if I increase that timeout, many CI servers will also kill off tests if there is no log output after a certain amount of time (e.g., 10 minutes in CircleCI).
  So now my tests are killed and I have nothing in the logs to tell me what happened.

But for (possibly) Go 1.14 (Q1 2020): CL 127120

testing: stream log output in verbose mode

The output now is:

=== RUN   TestFoo
=== PAUSE TestFoo
=== RUN   TestBar
=== PAUSE TestBar
=== RUN   TestGaz
=== PAUSE TestGaz
=== CONT  TestFoo
    TestFoo: main_test.go:14: hello from foo
=== CONT  TestGaz
=== CONT  TestBar
    TestGaz: main_test.go:38: hello from gaz
    TestBar: main_test.go:26: hello from bar
    TestFoo: main_test.go:14: hello from foo
    TestBar: main_test.go:26: hello from bar
    TestGaz: main_test.go:38: hello from gaz
    TestFoo: main_test.go:14: hello from foo
    TestGaz: main_test.go:38: hello from gaz
    TestBar: main_test.go:26: hello from bar
    TestFoo: main_test.go:14: hello from foo
    TestGaz: main_test.go:38: hello from gaz
    TestBar: main_test.go:26: hello from bar
    TestGaz: main_test.go:38: hello from gaz
    TestFoo: main_test.go:14: hello from foo
    TestBar: main_test.go:26: hello from bar
--- PASS: TestFoo (1.00s)
--- PASS: TestGaz (1.00s)
--- PASS: TestBar (1.00s)
PASS
ok      dummy/streaming-test    1.022s

---

It is indeed in Go 1.14, as Dave Cheney attests in "go test -v streaming output":

In Go 1.14, go test -v will stream t.Log output as it happens, rather than hoarding it til the end of the test run.

Under Go 1.14 the fmt.Println and t.Log lines are interleaved, rather than waiting for the test to complete, demonstrating that test output is streamed when go test -v is used.

Advantage, according to Dave:

This is a great quality of life improvement for integration style tests that often retry for long periods when the test is failing.
Streaming t.Log output will help Gophers debug those test failures without having to wait until the entire test times out to receive their output.

Answer 4

For testing sometimes I do

fmt.Fprintln(os.Stdout, "hello")

Also, you can print to:

fmt.Fprintln(os.Stderr, "hello)

Answer 5

t.Log and t.Logf do print out in your test but can often be missed as it prints on the same line as your test. What I do is Log them in a way that makes them stand out, ie

t.Run("FindIntercomUserAndReturnID should find an intercom user", func(t *testing.T) {

    id, err := ic.FindIntercomUserAndReturnID("[email protected]")
    assert.Nil(t, err)
    assert.NotNil(t, id)

    t.Logf("\n\nid: %v\n\n", *id)
})

which prints it to the terminal as,

=== RUN   TestIntercom
=== RUN   TestIntercom/FindIntercomUserAndReturnID_should_find_an_intercom_user
    TestIntercom/FindIntercomUserAndReturnID_should_find_an_intercom_user: intercom_test.go:34:

        id: 5ea8caed05a4862c0d712008

--- PASS: TestIntercom (1.45s)
    --- PASS: TestIntercom/FindIntercomUserAndReturnID_should_find_an_intercom_user (1.45s)
PASS
ok      github.com/RuNpiXelruN/third-party-delete-service   1.470s

Answer 6

In case your using testing.M and associated setup/teardown; -v is valid here as well.

package g 

import (
    "os"
    "fmt"
    "testing"
)

func TestSomething(t *testing.T) {
    t.Skip("later")
}

func setup() {
    fmt.Println("setting up")
}

func teardown() {
    fmt.Println("tearing down")
}

func TestMain(m *testing.M) {
    setup()
    result := m.Run()
    teardown()
    os.Exit(result)
}

$ go test -v g_test.go 
setting up
=== RUN   TestSomething
    g_test.go:10: later
--- SKIP: TestSomething (0.00s)
PASS
tearing down
ok      command-line-arguments  0.002s

Answer 7

The *_test.go file is a Go source like the others, you can initialize a new logger every time if you need to dump complex data structure, here an example:

// initZapLog is delegated to initialize a new 'log manager'
func initZapLog() *zap.Logger {
    config := zap.NewDevelopmentConfig()
    config.EncoderConfig.EncodeLevel = zapcore.CapitalColorLevelEncoder
    config.EncoderConfig.TimeKey = "timestamp"
    config.EncoderConfig.EncodeTime = zapcore.ISO8601TimeEncoder
    logger, _ := config.Build()
    return logger
}

Then, every time, in every test:

func TestCreateDB(t *testing.T) {
    loggerMgr := initZapLog()
    // Make logger avaible everywhere
    zap.ReplaceGlobals(loggerMgr)
    defer loggerMgr.Sync() // flushes buffer, if any
    logger := loggerMgr.Sugar()
    logger.Debug("START")
    conf := initConf()
    /* Your test here
    if false {
        t.Fail()
    }*/
}