Awesome Embedded Testing

Tools, frameworks, and resources for testing embedded and low-level software, covering unit testing, mocking, hardware simulation, static and dynamic analysis, continuous integration, and hardware-in-the-loop automation.

Contents

• Test Frameworks
  • Rust Test Frameworks
  • General Embedded Testing Frameworks
  • Mocking and Hardware Simulation
  • Continuous Integration
  • Static and Dynamic Analysis
  • Embedded-Specific Techniques and Tools
  • Test Automation and Hardware-in-the-Loop
  • Examples and Reference Projects

Test Frameworks

Rust Test Frameworks

• embedded-test - Rust test harness and runner for embedded devices.
• defmt-test - Rust test harness that lets you write and run unit tests on your device as if using the built-in #[test] attribute.

General Embedded Testing Frameworks

• Ceedling/Unity - Popular C-based unit testing and build framework, great for small to medium-sized embedded projects.
• GoogleTest - Widely used and highly customizable C++ testing framework, commonly adopted in embedded C++ projects.
• CppUTest - C and C++ testing framework tailored specifically to embedded software, emphasizing memory safety and simplicity.
• Catch2 - Modern C++ testing framework known for ease of use and expressive assertions, lightweight enough for embedded targets.

Mocking and Hardware Simulation

• CMock - Generates mock objects automatically for C, ideal for testing interactions with hardware-dependent code.
• Fake Function Framework (FFF) - Lightweight, simple mocking framework for C-based embedded software.
• Renode - Multi-architecture framework for hardware simulation and testing, allowing execution and debugging of embedded binaries without actual hardware.
• QEMU - Widely adopted open-source emulator, very useful for full-system simulation of embedded platforms during testing.
• embedded-hal-mock - Mocks for testing Rust embedded-hal based drivers without hardware access.

Continuous Integration

• PlatformIO - Cross-platform build tool and package manager, ideal for automating builds and tests for embedded projects.
• Embench - Open-source benchmarking suite specifically targeting IoT-class embedded systems.
• Robot Framework - Generic Python-based acceptance-test automation framework, commonly used for higher-level integration and system tests.

Static and Dynamic Analysis

• Cppcheck - Popular static analysis tool specifically tailored for C and C++ codebases.
• Valgrind - Dynamic analysis tool useful for memory leak detection and error tracking.
• Clang Sanitizers - Effective runtime debugging tools for detecting memory safety errors in embedded C and C++ applications.

Embedded-Specific Techniques and Tools

• Embedded Artistry's Embedded Resources - Curated resources and examples for best practices in embedded software testing.
• Tracealyzer - Real-time trace visualization for debugging and performance analysis of embedded systems (commercial with free tiers).

Test Automation and Hardware-in-the-Loop

• Labgrid - Python-based automation framework for hardware-in-the-loop testing, integrates smoothly with continuous integration.
• OpenHTF - Python hardware testing framework from Google designed for automated manufacturing tests and hardware-in-the-loop testing.
• OnMCU - CLI for remote MCU development, flashing, and testing on real hardware hosted on the OnMCU platform.
• SiliconRig - CLI, Python SDK, and GitHub Action for flashing and testing firmware on real boards (ESP32-S3, STM32, RP2350) hosted on the SiliconRig platform.

Examples and Reference Projects

• NASA JPL's F Prime - NASA's open-source C++ flight software framework, extensively tested and validated.
• LVGL - Embedded GUI library written in C, extensively using unit tests and automated integration testing.