gitbeaker/docs/TESTING.md

Testing Guide

This guide covers both containerized testing (recommended) and manual testing approaches.

• Unit Tests: Test individual functions and components in isolation
• Integration Tests: Test API interactions with a real GitLab instance
• End-to-End Tests: Test complete workflows from client to server

🐳 Containerized Testing (Recommended)

The easiest way to run the full test suite is using Docker, which provides a consistent, isolated environment.

Quick Start

Run the complete test suite (unit + integration + e2e):

yarn test:full

This command will:

• Start a GitLab CE instance using Docker Compose
• Wait for GitLab to be healthy and ready
• Set required environment variables
• Clean and build the project
• Run all test types sequentially (types, unit, integration, e2e)
• Keep GitLab running for additional testing (optional cleanup)

Individual Test Types

You can also run specific test types individually:

# Type tests only
yarn test:types

# Unit tests only
yarn test:unit

# Integration tests only (requires GitLab running)
yarn test:integration

# End-to-end tests only
yarn test:e2e

Manual GitLab Instance

To start just the GitLab instance for manual testing:

cd .docker && docker-compose up gitlab

GitLab will be available at http://localhost:8080 with:

• Username: root
• Password: gitbeaker
• Personal Access Token: superstrongpassword123

🛠️ Local Testing (Alternative)

For contributors who prefer to test locally without Docker:

Unit Tests

yarn test:unit

Integration Tests

1. First, run GitLab in a docker container:

cd .docker && docker-compose up gitlab

2. Once GitLab is up on localhost:8080, set the environment variables:

export GITLAB_URL="http://localhost:8080"
export GITLAB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN="superstrongpassword123"

3. Run the integration tests:

yarn test:integration

You can also define them inline:

GITLAB_URL='http://localhost:8080' GITLAB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN='superstrongpassword123' yarn test:integration

End-to-End Tests

yarn test:e2e

Note: It may take about 3 minutes for GitLab to fully start up in the container

🔧 Troubleshooting

Docker Issues

If you encounter Docker build issues:

# Clean Docker cache
docker system prune -f

# Rebuild containers
cd .docker && docker-compose build --no-cache

SSL Certificate Issues

If you're behind a corporate firewall, you may need to configure Docker to trust your certificates or use alternative registries.

GitLab Startup

GitLab requires significant resources and startup time. Ensure you have:

• At least 4GB of available RAM
• Docker Desktop running with sufficient memory allocation
• Wait 2-3 minutes for GitLab to be fully ready