Unit testing C# protected methods

I come from the Java EE world but now I'm working on a .Net project. In Java when I wanted to test a protected method it was quite easy, just having the test class with the same package name was enough.

Is there anything similar for C#? Is there any good practice for unit testing the protected methods? I only found frameworks and people saying that I should test only public methods.

It should be possible to do it without any framework…

Solution 1:

You can inherit the class you are testing on your test class.

[TestClass]
public class Test1 : SomeClass
{
    [TestMethod]
    public void MyTest
    {
        Assert.AreEqual(1, ProtectedMethod());
    }

}

Solution 2:

Another option is to use internal for these methods and then use InternalsVisibleTo to allow your test assembly to access these methods. This does not stop the methods being consumed by other classes in the same assembly, but it does stop them being accessed by other assembles that are not your test assembly.

This does not give you as much encapsulation and protection but it's pretty straight forward and can be useful.

Add to AssemblyInfo.cs in the assembly containing the internal methods

[assembly: InternalsVisibleTo("TestsAssembly")]