Test java programs that read from stdin and write to stdout

Question

I am writing some code for a programming contest in java. The input to the program is given using stdin and output is on stdout. How are you folks testing programs that work

Answer 1

I am writing some code for a programming contest in java. The input to the program is given using stdin and output is on stdout. How are you folks testing programs that work on stdin/stdout?

Another way to send characters to System.in is to use PipedInputStream and PipedOutputStream. Maybe something like the following:

PipedInputStream pipeIn = new PipedInputStream(1024);
System.setIn(pipeIn);

PipedOutputStream pipeOut = new PipedOutputStream(pipeIn);

// then I can write to the pipe
pipeOut.write(new byte[] { ... });

// if I need a writer I do:
Writer writer = OutputStreamWriter(pipeOut);
writer.write("some string");

// call code that reads from System.in
processInput();

On the flip side, as mentioned by @Mihai Toader, if I need to test System.out then I do something like:

ByteArrayOutputStream baos = new ByteArrayOutputStream();
System.setOut(new PrintStream(baos));

// call code that prints to System.out
printSomeOutput();

// now interrogate the byte[] inside of baos
byte[] outputBytes = baos.toByteArray();
// if I need it as a string I do
String outputStr = baos.toString();

Assert.assertTrue(outputStr.contains("some important output"));