Is there a way to unit test an async method?

Question

I am using Xunit and NMock on .NET platform. I am testing a presentation model where a method is asynchronous. The method creates an async task and executes it so the method returns immediately and the state I need to check aren't ready yet.

I can set a flag upon finish without modifying the SUT but that would mean I would have to keep checking the flag in a while loop for example, with perhaps timeout.

What are my options?

Answer 1

Does your object feature any sort of signal that the asynchronous method is finished, such as an event? If that is the case, you can use the following approach:

[Test]
public void CanTestAsync()
{
    MyObject instance = new MyObject()
    AutoResetEvent waitHandle = new AutoResetEvent(false); 
    // create and attach event handler for the "Finished" event
    EventHandler eventHandler = delegate(object sender, EventArgs e) 
    {
        waitHandle.Set();  // signal that the finished event was raised
    } 
    instance.AsyncMethodFinished += eventHandler;

    // call the async method
    instance.CallAsyncMethod();

    // Wait until the event handler is invoked
    if (!waitHandle.WaitOne(5000, false))  
    {  
        Assert.Fail("Test timed out.");  
    }  
    instance.AsyncMethodFinished -= eventHandler;    
    Assert.AreEqual("expected", instance.ValueToCheck);
}