Testing with Codeception
PhpStorm provides support for running unit, functional, and aceptance tests with the Codeception test framework, versions 2.2.0 and higher.
On this page:
- Before you start
- Downloading and installing Codeception
- Configuring Codeception in PhpStorm
- Initializing Codeception in project
- Creating a run configuration of the type Codeception
- Launching Tests
Before you start
- Make sure the PHP and Codeception plugins are installed and enabled. The plugins are bundled with PhpStorm and activated by default. If the plugins are not activated, enable them on the Plugins page of the Settings / Preferences Dialog as described in Enabling and Disabling Plugins.
- Configure the PHP interpreter to use Codeception with, as described in Configuring Local PHP Interpreters and Configuring Remote PHP Interpreters.
Downloading and installing Codeception
You can acquire Codeception in the following ways:
Downloading the codeception.phar archive
- Download
codeception.phar
at the Codeception Installation page. - Save
codeception.phar
under the root of the project where Codeception will be later used. You can also savecodeception.phar
anywhere else and configure it as an include path. In either case, PhpStorm will includecodeception.phar
in indexing, so PhpStorm will successfully resolve references to Codeception classes and thus provide you with full coding assistance.
Installing Codeception using the Composer dependency manager
Before you start, make sure Composer is installed on your machine and initialized in the current project, see Using Composer Dependency Manager.
- On the main menu, choose .
- In the Add Composer Dependency dialog that opens, select the
codeception/codeception
package from the Available Packages list, possibly using the search field. The list shows all the available packages, however, the packages that have been already installed are marked with a tick.
Choose the relevant version from the Version to install drop-down list. - If necessary, expand the Settings hidden area and specify the advanced installation options. In the Command line parameters text box, type the additional command line parameters to adjust the add dependency procedure. For example, to have the package added to the
require-dev
section instead of the defaultrequire
section type-dev
. For more information about Composer command line options during installation, see https://getcomposer.org/doc/03-cli.md. - Click Install.
Configuring Codeception in PhpStorm
- Open the Settings / Preferences Dialog by pressing Ctrl+Alt+S or by choosing for Windows and Linux or for macOS. Expand the Languages & Frameworks node, and then click Codeception under PHP.
The Codeception page opens. - In the central pane, choose the PHP interpreter to use Codeception with. This PHP interpreter can be installed either locally, or in a Vagrant virtual environment, or on a remote host, or in a Docker container. For information on configuring PHP interpreters, see Configuring Local PHP Interpreters and Configuring Remote PHP Interpreters. The central pane of the page shows a list of configured PHP interpreters that are associated with Codeception installations. The list contains at least one item (Local) which cannot be removed. The contents of the right-hand pane depend on the type of the selected interpreter.
- To use Codeception with a local PHP interpreter, choose Local in the central pane, and in the Codeception Library area, specify the location of the Codeception executable file or
codeception.phar
archive. For example, if you installed Codeception through the Composer dependency manager, the location isvendor/bin/codecept
. Click next to the Path to Codeception directory or phar file text box. PhpStorm detects the version of Codeception and displays it below the text box. - To use Codeception with a remote PHP interpreter, click , and from the Codeception by Remote Interpreter dialog box choose the PHP interpreter configuration in a Vagrant environment, in a Docker container, or on a remote host with SSH access.
- In the Codeception Library area, specify the location of the Codeception executable file or
codeception.phar
archive in the target environment. Click next to the Path to Codeception directory or phar file text box. PhpStorm detects the version of Codeception and displays it below the text box. - Specify the Path Mappings between your local sources and the sources inside the Vagrant instance, or the Docker container, or on the remote host.
- If the selected interpreter runs in a Docker container, specify the Docker container settings that will be used to start the container from an image. These settings may include the volume configuration, the exposed port, the network, etc.
In most cases, PhpStorm detects the path mappings and the container settings and fills in all the fields automatically. Alternatively, click the next to the field in question and specify the settings manually.
- In the Codeception Library area, specify the location of the Codeception executable file or
- To use Codeception with a local PHP interpreter, choose Local in the central pane, and in the Codeception Library area, specify the location of the Codeception executable file or
- In the Test Runner area, appoint the configuration
.yml
file to use for launching and executing scenarios.By default, Codeception looks for a
codeception.yml
configuration file in the project root folder. You can appoint a custom configuration file.- Clear the Default configuration file check box to have Codeception use the
codeception.yml
configuration file from the project root folder. If no such file is found, test execution fails, therefore it may be more reliable to specify the configuration file explicitly. - Select the Default configuration file check box to specify your own
.yml
configuration file. This file will be later used as default in all Codeception run/debug configurations.In the text box, specify the location of the configuration file to use. Type the path manually or click the button and choose the file in the dialog box that opens.
- Clear the Default configuration file check box to have Codeception use the
Initializing Codeception in project
To generate a codeception.yml
configuration file, open the built-in PhpStorm Terminal (press Alt+F12 or choose on the main menu) and at the command line prompt type one of the following commands depending on the installation mode and your current operating system:
- If you installed
codeception.phar
in your project, typephp codecept.phar bootstrap
for Windows and macOS orcodecept bootstrap
for Linux. - If you installed Codeception through Composer, type
codecept bootstrap
for all platforms.
Creating a run configuration of the type Codeception
- Choose on the main menu
- In the Edit Configuration dialog box that opens, click the Add New Configuration toolbar button , and choose Codeception on the context menu.
- In the Run/Debug Configuration: Codeception dialog box, specify the tests to run and customize the behavior of the current PHP interpreter by specifying the options and arguments to be passed to the PHP executable file.
Launching Tests
For information about writing Codeception tests, see Unit Tests, Acceptance Tests, and Functional Tests. To run or debug your tests, do one of the following:
- On the main menu, choose and monitor test results in the Run tool window as described in Viewing and Exploring Test Results.
- On the main menu, choose and debug the tests in the Debug tool window.