Functional testing and unit testing are two types of testing methodologies used in software development, each with a distinct purpose and scope.
Unit Testing
Unit testing is a type of testing that focuses on testing the smallest possible units of your code, which are usually individual functions or methods. The purpose of unit testing is to ensure that each piece of your code works correctly in isolation.
In unit testing, you typically mock or stub dependencies of the function you're testing so that you're only testing the functionality of that one function, not the dependencies. This also allows you to test how your function behaves with different outputs from its dependencies.
For example, if you're writing a function that uses a database, in your unit test for that function, you would mock the database so that you're not actually connecting to a database while running the test.
Functional Testing
Functional testing, on the other hand, is a type of testing that focuses on testing the functionality of larger pieces of your software, up to and including the entire application. Functional tests are intended to test the software as a whole, to ensure that it works correctly in combination and that it does what it's supposed to do from the user's perspective.
Functional tests usually involve integration with all parts of the system, including databases, networks, etc. These tests typically include tests of the user interface and tests of functionality from the user's point of view.
In summary, while unit testing is concerned with the correctness of individual functions or methods in isolation, functional testing is concerned with the correctness and functionality of larger parts of your software, up to and including the entire system. Both types of testing are important and have their own place in a well-rounded testing strategy.
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