During a recent project, I encountered problems with the flash messenger not playing ball with PHPUnit. The problem, the FlashMessenger using a session namespace, and trying to start the session. Additionally to this problem, how do you test that the flash message is set as you'd expect (or not as the case may be). The answer to both of these problems, lies in the same solution. a Mock Object.

He includes the code to mock out the FlashMessenger component and expose the "addMessage" method. In his first test, the assertion is that this method is never called (failure if it is) and in the second, it should only be called once.

The new dependencies of the PHPUnit package, such as PHPUnit_MockObject for instance, are installed first. The PHPUnit package itself is installed last. And herein lies the problem: PHPUnit_MockObject installs the new version of MockObject/Generator.php before the PHPUnit package is upgraded. This upgrade deletes the MockObject/Generator.php file as it previously belonged to the PHPUnit package.

He includes two complete file listings showing the difference in the structure before and after the upgrade. The PEAR installer is at fault due to a misunderstanding it has about where the MockObject/Generator.php file belongs. The only way to fix this, currently, is to force install the new subpackages instead of just an update - DbUnit, PHPUnit_MockObject and PHPUnit_Selenium. Instructions and a resulting files tree are included so you can insure your install is correct.

The last weeks have been busy, but now I want to take the time to finally give you an update on the status of PHPUnit. The development of PHPUnit 3.1 is progressing nicely, about the only thing missing is finishing the documentation for all the new features

Among these new features are things like:

• improvements in mock objects
• the ability for PHPUnit to write code coverage information to a test database
• some fun new template methods
• and mutation testing that's being built on the separate branch