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Transport Test Doubles

Before You Start​

  • Install the testing package:

    dotnet add package Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing

  • Familiarity with the transport abstractions: ITransportSender, ITransportReceiver, ITransportSubscriber

Overview​

The Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing.Transport namespace provides three in-memory transport implementations that replace real infrastructure (RabbitMQ, Kafka, Azure Service Bus, etc.) in tests. Each implementation records interactions for assertions and provides test-controllable behavior.

Test DoubleReplacesKey Feature
InMemoryTransportSenderITransportSenderRecords sent messages, configurable send behavior
InMemoryTransportReceiverITransportReceiverEnqueue-then-receive, tracks ack/reject
InMemoryTransportSubscriberITransportSubscriberPush messages to handler, inspect results

All three are thread-safe, implement IAsyncDisposable, and follow the InMemoryChatClient pattern from Microsoft.Extensions.AI.

InMemoryTransportSender​

Recording Sent Messages​

Every call to SendAsync or SendBatchAsync records the message in SentMessages:

using Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing.Transport;
using Excalibur.Dispatch.Transport;

// Defined in: Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing/Transport/InMemoryTransportSender.cs
var sender = new InMemoryTransportSender("orders-topic");

await sender.SendAsync(
    TransportMessage.FromString("order-created"),
    CancellationToken.None);

sender.SentMessages.Count.ShouldBe(1);
sender.SentMessages[0].ContentType.ShouldBe("text/plain");
sender.Destination.ShouldBe("orders-topic");

Custom Send Behavior (OnSend)​

By default, every send returns SendResult.Success. Use OnSend to control the result per message -- simulate failures, test retry logic, or validate message content:

var sender = new InMemoryTransportSender("orders-topic")
    .OnSend(message =>
    {
        // Simulate failure for messages without a correlation ID
        if (message.CorrelationId is null)
        {
            return SendResult.Failure("Missing correlation ID");
        }

        return SendResult.Success(message.Id);
    });

var result = await sender.SendAsync(
    TransportMessage.FromString("no-correlation"),
    CancellationToken.None);

result.IsSuccess.ShouldBeFalse();

The OnSend callback receives each TransportMessage and returns a SendResult. The message is still recorded in SentMessages regardless of the result.

Batch Sending​

SendBatchAsync invokes the OnSend callback for each message individually and returns a BatchSendResult with per-message results:

var sender = new InMemoryTransportSender("events-topic");
var messages = new List<TransportMessage>
{
    TransportMessage.FromString("event-1"),
    TransportMessage.FromString("event-2"),
    TransportMessage.FromString("event-3"),
};

var batchResult = await sender.SendBatchAsync(messages, CancellationToken.None);

batchResult.TotalMessages.ShouldBe(3);
batchResult.SuccessCount.ShouldBe(3);
batchResult.FailureCount.ShouldBe(0);
sender.SentMessages.Count.ShouldBe(3);

Clearing State​

Call Clear() to reset the sender between tests:

sender.Clear();
sender.SentMessages.Count.ShouldBe(0);

InMemoryTransportReceiver​

Enqueuing Test Messages​

Tests control what messages are available by calling Enqueue before ReceiveAsync:

using Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing.Transport;
using Excalibur.Dispatch.Transport;

// Defined in: Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing/Transport/InMemoryTransportReceiver.cs
var receiver = new InMemoryTransportReceiver("orders-queue");

receiver.Enqueue(new TransportReceivedMessage
{
    Id = "msg-1",
    Body = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes("order-data"),
    ContentType = "application/json",
});

Enqueue multiple messages at once:

receiver.Enqueue(
    new TransportReceivedMessage { Id = "msg-1", Body = body1 },
    new TransportReceivedMessage { Id = "msg-2", Body = body2 }
);

Non-Blocking ReceiveAsync​

ReceiveAsync returns immediately with whatever messages are currently in the queue, up to maxMessages. It does not block or wait for messages:

receiver.Enqueue(new TransportReceivedMessage { Id = "msg-1" });
receiver.Enqueue(new TransportReceivedMessage { Id = "msg-2" });
receiver.Enqueue(new TransportReceivedMessage { Id = "msg-3" });

var batch = await receiver.ReceiveAsync(2, CancellationToken.None);
batch.Count.ShouldBe(2);

var remaining = await receiver.ReceiveAsync(10, CancellationToken.None);
remaining.Count.ShouldBe(1);

var empty = await receiver.ReceiveAsync(10, CancellationToken.None);
empty.Count.ShouldBe(0);

Settlement Tracking (Acknowledged, Rejected)​

After receiving messages, call AcknowledgeAsync or RejectAsync to settle them. The receiver tracks all settlements:

receiver.Enqueue(new TransportReceivedMessage { Id = "msg-1" });
var messages = await receiver.ReceiveAsync(10, CancellationToken.None);

// Acknowledge the message
await receiver.AcknowledgeAsync(messages[0], CancellationToken.None);
receiver.AcknowledgedMessages.Count.ShouldBe(1);

// Or reject with a reason
receiver.Enqueue(new TransportReceivedMessage { Id = "msg-2" });
var batch2 = await receiver.ReceiveAsync(10, CancellationToken.None);
await receiver.RejectAsync(batch2[0], "Invalid format", requeue: false, CancellationToken.None);

receiver.RejectedMessages.Count.ShouldBe(1);
receiver.RejectedMessages[0].Reason.ShouldBe("Invalid format");
receiver.RejectedMessages[0].Requeue.ShouldBeFalse();

The RejectedMessage record captures the message, reason, and whether requeue was requested:

// Defined in: Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing/Transport/InMemoryTransportReceiver.cs
public sealed record RejectedMessage(
    TransportReceivedMessage Message,
    string? Reason,
    bool Requeue);

Clearing State​

Clear() drains pending, acknowledged, and rejected messages:

receiver.Clear();

InMemoryTransportSubscriber​

Push-Based Testing​

Unlike the receiver (pull-based), the subscriber uses a push model. First register a handler via SubscribeAsync, then push messages from test code via PushAsync:

using Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing.Transport;
using Excalibur.Dispatch.Transport;

// Defined in: Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing/Transport/InMemoryTransportSubscriber.cs
var subscriber = new InMemoryTransportSubscriber("orders-topic");

// Start subscription in background
using var cts = new CancellationTokenSource();
var subscribeTask = subscriber.SubscribeAsync(
    (message, cancellationToken) =>
    {
        // Process the message and return an action
        return Task.FromResult(MessageAction.Acknowledge);
    },
    cts.Token);

// Push a test message
var action = await subscriber.PushAsync(
    new TransportReceivedMessage { Id = "msg-1" },
    CancellationToken.None);

action.ShouldBe(MessageAction.Acknowledge);

// Stop subscription
cts.Cancel();

Subscription Lifecycle​

SubscribeAsync stores the handler and blocks (via Task.Delay(Infinite)) until the cancellation token is cancelled. This mirrors the real subscriber behavior where subscription is a long-running operation:

subscriber.IsSubscribed.ShouldBeFalse();

using var cts = new CancellationTokenSource();
var subscribeTask = subscriber.SubscribeAsync(
    (msg, ct) => Task.FromResult(MessageAction.Acknowledge),
    cts.Token);

subscriber.IsSubscribed.ShouldBeTrue();

cts.Cancel();
await subscribeTask; // completes without throwing

subscriber.IsSubscribed.ShouldBeFalse();
note

PushAsync throws InvalidOperationException if called before SubscribeAsync. Always start the subscription first.

Processing Results​

Every message pushed through the subscriber is recorded in ProcessedMessages along with the handler's returned MessageAction:

// After pushing several messages...
subscriber.ProcessedMessages.Count.ShouldBe(3);

// Defined in: Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing/Transport/InMemoryTransportSubscriber.cs
// public sealed record ProcessedMessage(TransportReceivedMessage Message, MessageAction Action);
var first = subscriber.ProcessedMessages[0];
first.Message.Id.ShouldBe("msg-1");
first.Action.ShouldBe(MessageAction.Acknowledge);

Integration Test Example​

Combine the test harness with transport test doubles to test a full pipeline that sends messages to a transport:

using Excalibur.Dispatch.Abstractions;
using Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing;
using Excalibur.Dispatch.Testing.Transport;
using Excalibur.Dispatch.Transport;
using Microsoft.Extensions.DependencyInjection;

public class OrderPipelineWithTransportShould : IAsyncDisposable
{
    private readonly DispatchTestHarness _harness;
    private readonly InMemoryTransportSender _sender;

    public OrderPipelineWithTransportShould()
    {
        _sender = new InMemoryTransportSender("orders-topic");

        _harness = new DispatchTestHarness()
            .ConfigureServices(services =>
            {
                // Register the test double as the transport sender
                services.AddSingleton<ITransportSender>(_sender);
            })
            .ConfigureDispatch(dispatch =>
            {
                dispatch.AddHandlersFromAssembly(typeof(PublishOrderHandler).Assembly);
            });
    }

    [Fact]
    public async Task Send_order_event_to_transport()
    {
        // Arrange
        var context = new MessageContextBuilder()
            .WithCorrelationId("corr-001")
            .Build();

        // Act
        await _harness.Dispatcher.DispatchAsync(
            new PlaceOrderAction("customer-123", 99.99m),
            context,
            CancellationToken.None);

        // Assert -- message was dispatched through pipeline
        _harness.Dispatched.Any<PlaceOrderAction>().ShouldBeTrue();

        // Assert -- handler sent to transport
        _sender.SentMessages.Count.ShouldBe(1);
    }

    public async ValueTask DisposeAsync()
    {
        await _harness.DisposeAsync();
        await _sender.DisposeAsync();
    }
}

See Also​