How do you introduce unit testing into a large, legacy (C/C++) codebase?

Question

We have a large, multi-platform application written in C. (with a small but growing amount of C++) It has evolved over the years with many features you would expect in a lar

Answer 1

There is a philosophical aspect to it all.

Do you really want tested, fully functional, tidy code? Is it YOUR objective? Do YOU get any benefit at all from it?.

yes, at first this sounds totally stupid. But honestly, unless you are the actual owner of the system, and not just an employee, then bugs just means more work, more work means more money. You can be totally happy while working on a hairball.

I am just guessing here, but, the risk you are taking by taking on this huge fight is probably much higher than the possible pay back you get by getting the code tidy. If you lack the social skills to pull this through, you will just be seen as a troublemaker. I've seen these guys, and I've been one too. But of course, it's pretty cool if you do pull this through. I would be impressed.

But, if you feel you are bullied into spending extra hours now to keep an untidy system working, do you really think that that will change once the code gets tidy and nice?. No.. once the code gets nice and tidy, people will get all this free time to totally destroy it again at the first available deadline.

in the end it's the management that creates the workplace nice, not the code.