Use Flutter Hot Restart in the Integration Test
<h1>Introduction</h1>
<p>If you strike up a conversation with a Flutter developer on Flutter’s unique attributes, chances are they will be quick to highlight <a href="https://docs.flutter.dev/tools/hot-reload" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank"><strong>Hot Restart</strong></a> and <a href="https://docs.flutter.dev/tools/hot-reload" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank"><strong>Hot Reload</strong></a>. Often coming from an Android or iOS development background, they have spent years enduring lengthy app build times. Flutter brings the advantage of implementing changes into a running app within a heartbeat using these features, significantly enhancing the development pace.</p>
<h2>The Challenge</h2>
<p>Typically, Flutter developers employ the use of the <a href="https://docs.flutter.dev/testing/integration-tests" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">integration_test</a> suite (now a built-in package) to create comprehensive integration tests for their apps. The recommended Flutter approach is to run these integration tests using the <code>flutter drive</code>. This process involves building the app, executing the tests, terminating it, and finally, uninstalling it from the device. Thus, every time a test is due to run, developers must wait for the app to build and install on the device — the very issue we sought to avoid by wasting time on building.</p>
<p>This results in the time spent writing integration tests potentially exceeding that of actual app development. How can we persuade management to allocate time for writing integration tests when the current perception is that it’s a time-consuming endeavor? Moreover, an integration test can easily fail due to an inadvertent error during the initial writing phase, requiring another lengthy wait. How is this efficiently manageable?</p>
<p><a href="https://blog.stackademic.com/use-flutter-hot-restart-in-the-integration-test-911916eb5a7c"><strong>Read More</strong></a></p>