mocking - What is the best way to unit-test SLF4J log messages?

Question

I'm using slf4j and I want to unit test my code to make sure that warn/error log messages are generated under certain conditions. I'd rather these be strict unit tests, so I'd prefer not to have to pull up logging configuration from a file in order to test that the log messages are generated. The mocking framework I'm using is Mockito.

Answer 1

For testing slf4j without relying on a specific implementation (such as log4j), you can provide your own slf4j logging implementation as described in this SLF4J FAQ. Your implementation can record the messages that were logged and then be interrogated by your unit tests for validation.

The slf4j-test package does exactly this. It's an in-memory slf4j logging implementation that provides methods for retrieving logged messages.