Manipulating a mocked Calendar object to return specific days - junit

Question

I'm using a Calendar object to determine whether or not to increase the workload of a system based on current day/hour values. Given that this object uses static methods, I'm using PowerMock to mock the static methods with the following annotations:
#RunWith(PowerMockRunner.class)
#PrepareForTest({ Calendar.class })
The code under test is pretty simple (though my logic needs work, I know):
public void determineDefaultMaximumScans() throws ParseException{
parseTime();
Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance();
int dayOfWeek = cal.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_WEEK);
System.out.println(cal.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_WEEK));
if(dayOfWeek == (Calendar.SATURDAY) || dayOfWeek == (Calendar.SUNDAY)){
setDefaultMax(calculateNewDefaultMax(getDefaultMax()));
System.out.println("defaultMax increased by 20%");
} else {
if(currentTime.after(afterHoursBegin) && currentTime.before(afterHoursEnd)){
System.out.println("Not afterhours. Maintaining current maximum.");
setDefaultMax(defaultMax);
System.out.println("Current Maximum number of scans: " + getDefaultMax());
}
}
}
My test case reads as follows:
#SuppressWarnings("static-access")
#Test
public void testDetermineMaximumScans() throws ParseException{
PowerMock.mockStatic(Calendar.class);
String beginningTime = "18:00";
String endingTime = "05:00";
mockAfterHoursBegin = parser.parse(beginningTime);
mockAfterHoursEnd = parser.parse(endingTime);
mockCurrentTime = parser.parse(parser.format(new Date()));
EasyMock.expect(Calendar.getInstance()).andReturn(mockCalendar);
EasyMock.expect(mockCalendar.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_WEEK)).andReturn(6);
EasyMock.replay(mocks);
offHourMaximumCalculator.determineDefaultMaximumScans();
EasyMock.verify(mocks);
}
As of now, all of my attempts to return a specific value result in the following assertion error. Now I vaguely understand why it's returning the default but I do not see why I can't force the value or how to get around this expectation. Mocks in general are still a frustrating mystery to me. What am I missing?
java.lang.AssertionError:
Expectation failure on verify:
Calendar.get(7): expected: 1, actual: 0

Answer 1

Mocks are fairly simple. But wanting to mock static methods is a big running after complexity. I generally do not recommend to mock something like a Calendar. If you do weird and complex thing with it, just encapsulate in something you can test and mock easily.
And in fact, we pretty much never use Calendar.getInstance(). It returns something according to the locale. But it's rare that you don't want a specific calendar i.e. GregorianCalendar. So just do new GregorianCalendar.
But anyway, add a protected method doing
protected Calendar newCalendar() {
return Calendar.getInstance(); // or new GregorianCalendar()
}
will take 2 minutes and then a simple partial mock will do the trick.
Finally, I also don't recommend to use Calendar. You have a much nicer API in java.util.date in Java 8.
All this said, here is how you should do it. Calendar is a system class, so you need to follow a real specific path which is explained here.
#RunWith(PowerMockRunner.class)
#PrepareForTest(Calendar.class)
public class MyTest {
#Test
public void testDetermineMaximumScans() throws ParseException {
PowerMock.mockStatic(Calendar.class);
Calendar calendar = mock(Calendar.class);
EasyMock.expect(Calendar.getInstance()).andReturn(calendar);
EasyMock.expect(calendar.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_WEEK)).andReturn(6);
// really important to replayAll to replay the static expectation
PowerMock.replayAll(calendar);
assertThat(Calendar.getInstance().get(Calendar.DAY_OF_WEEK)).isEqualTo(6);
// and verifyAll is you want to verify that the static call actually happened
PowerMock.verifyAll();
}
}