grunt-karma-0.9.1

grunt-karma

Grunt plugin for Karma NOTE: this plugin requires Grunt 0.4.x

Getting Started

From the same directory as your project's Gruntfile and package.json, install this plugin with the following command:

npm install grunt-karma --save-dev

Once that's done, add this line to your project's Gruntfile:

grunt.loadNpmTasks('grunt-karma');

Config

Inside your Gruntfile.js file, add a section named karma, containing any number of configurations for running karma. The only required option is the path to the karma config file. Here's a simple example:

karma: {
  unit: {
    configFile: 'karma.conf.js'
  }
}

You can override any of the config file's settings directly:

karma: {
  unit: {
    configFile: 'karma.conf.js',
    runnerPort: 9999,
    singleRun: true,
    browsers: ['PhantomJS']
  }
}

Sharing Configs

If you have multiple targets, it may be helpful to share common configuration settings between them. Grunt-karma supports this by using the options property:

karma: {
  options: {
    configFile: 'karma.conf.js',
    runnerPort: 9999,
    browsers: ['Chrome', 'Firefox']
  },
  continuous: {
    singleRun: true
    browsers: ['PhantomJS']
  },
  dev: {
    reporters: 'dots'
  }
}

In this example the continuous and dev targets will both use the configFile and runnerPort specified in the options. But the continuous target will override the browser setting to use PhantomJS, and also run as a singleRun. The dev target will simply change the reporter to dots.

Running tests

There are three ways to run your tests with karma:

Karma Server with Auto Runs on File Change

Setting the autoWatch option to true will instruct karma to start a server and watch for changes to files, running tests automatically:

karma: {
  unit: {
    configFile: 'karma.conf.js',
    autoWatch: true
  }
}

Now run $ grunt karma

However, usually Grunt projects watch many types of files using grunt-contrib-watch or grunt-regarde, so this option isn't preferred.

Karma Server with Grunt Watch/Regarde

Config karma like usual (without the autoWatch option), and add background:true:

karma: {
  unit: {
    configFile: 'karma.conf.js',
    background: true
  }
}

The background option will tell grunt to run karma in a child process so it doesn't block subsequent grunt tasks.

Config your watch or regarde task to run the karma task with the :run flag. For example:

watch: {
  //run unit tests with karma (server needs to be already running)
  karma: {
    files: ['app/js/**/*.js', 'test/browser/**/*.js'],
    tasks: ['karma:unit:run'] //NOTE the :run flag
  }
},

In your terminal window run $ grunt karma:unit watch, which runs both the karma task and the watch task. Now when grunt watch detects a change to one of your watched files, it will run the tests specified in the unit target using the already running karma server. This is the preferred method for development.

Single Run

Keeping a browser window & karma server running during development is productive, but not a good solution for build processes. For that reason karma provides a "continuous integration" mode, which will launch the specified browser(s), run the tests, and close the browser(s). It also supports running tests in PhantomJS, a headless webkit browser which is great for running tests as part of a build. To run tests in continous integration mode just add the singleRun option:

karma: {
  unit: {
    configFile: 'config/karma.conf.js',
  },
  //continuous integration mode: run tests once in PhantomJS browser.
  continuous: {
    configFile: 'config/karma.conf.js',
    singleRun: true,
    browsers: ['PhantomJS']
  },
}

The build would then run grunt karma:continuous to start PhantomJS, run tests, and close PhantomJS.

License

MIT License