Problems using dbunit with Spring (without spring-test-dbunit)

Question

I'm trying to use dbunit to test my DAOs. We use Spring in a version that is not compatible with spring-test-dbunit. I can't autowire my dao beans into my test class, because then I would have to use @RunWith(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.class) which regards one parameterless constructor. My class looks like following:

public class DbUnitExample extends DBTestCase {

    @Autowired
    public MyDAO myDAO;


    public DbUnitExample(String name) {
        super(name);
        System.setProperty(PropertiesBasedJdbcDatabaseTester.DBUNIT_DRIVER_CLASS, "com.mysql.jdbc.Driver");
        System.setProperty(PropertiesBasedJdbcDatabaseTester.DBUNIT_CONNECTION_URL, "...");
        System.setProperty(PropertiesBasedJdbcDatabaseTester.DBUNIT_USERNAME, "...");
        System.setProperty(PropertiesBasedJdbcDatabaseTester.DBUNIT_PASSWORD, "...");
    }

    @Override
    protected IDataSet getDataSet() throws Exception {
        return new FlatXmlDataSetBuilder().build(new FileInputStream("target/partial.xml"));
    }

    @Override
    protected DatabaseOperation getSetUpOperation() throws Exception {
        return DatabaseOperation.REFRESH;
    }

    @Override
    protected DatabaseOperation getTearDownOperation() throws Exception {
        return DatabaseOperation.NONE;
    }

    @Test
    public void testSometing() throws Exception {
        myDAO.deleteById(12662);
    }
}

Of course I get an NPE because my dao bean can't be found. When I use @RunWith(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.class) I need to provide one parameterless constructor and have to delete my "dbunit"-constructor. Is there a standard way or workaround to use dbunit with spring without the use of spring-test-dbunit

EDIT

My class now looks like following:

@RunWith(SpringJUnit4ClassRunner.class)
@ContextConfiguration("/test-application.xml")
@DirtiesContext
@TestExecutionListeners({ DependencyInjectionTestExecutionListener.class, DirtiesContextTestExecutionListener.class })
public class DbUnitExample extends DBTestCase {

    @Autowired
    public MyDAO myDAO;

    public DbUnitExample() {
        super("target/partial.xml");
        System.setProperty(PropertiesBasedJdbcDatabaseTester.DBUNIT_DRIVER_CLASS, "com.mysql.jdbc.Driver");
        System.setProperty(PropertiesBasedJdbcDatabaseTester.DBUNIT_CONNECTION_URL, "...");
        System.setProperty(PropertiesBasedJdbcDatabaseTester.DBUNIT_USERNAME, "...");
        System.setProperty(PropertiesBasedJdbcDatabaseTester.DBUNIT_PASSWORD, "...");
    }

    @Override
    protected IDataSet getDataSet() throws Exception {
        return new FlatXmlDataSetBuilder().build(new FileInputStream("target/partial.xml"));
    }

    @Override
    protected DatabaseOperation getSetUpOperation() throws Exception {
        return DatabaseOperation.REFRESH;
    }

    @Override
    protected DatabaseOperation getTearDownOperation() throws Exception {
//      return DatabaseOperation.NONE;
//      return DatabaseOperation.REFRESH;
        return DatabaseOperation.CLEAN_INSERT;
    }

    @Test
    public void testSometing() throws Exception {
        myDAO.deleteById(12662);
    }
}

It compiles now, but has no dbunt-functionality, which means if I delete a row it doesn't get restored to it's previous state (inserted again).

Answer 1

Since you are using Spring, I suggest autowiring the dbUnit instances into the test. The dbUnit Test Cases page has "Configuration Example Using Spring" for the PrepAndExpectedTestCase , but just copy the code and change it to DBTestCase and adjust accordingly.