In my ongoing struggle to find a todo list app I like, I took a look at Todo.txt. I ended up going back to GoodTodo, but I was intrigued by the text based system. I wanted to build something in Excel to be an interface to Todo.txt and I used a test-first methodology to parse the file. You may remember my first foray into test-first development when I converted numbers into words.

Later this week, I’ll post how I wrote the parser using tests. If you’ve ever wanted to try to write code using test-first, here’s your chance. Download the workbook below. I’ve setup all the classes and the tests. I even wrote enough code to make the first test pass. If you’re interested in this exercise, follow these steps:

1. Download, unzip, and open the workbook
2. Go to the MTest module and run the TEST_All sub and see that it passes
3. Uncomment each link in TEST_All one at a time
4. Run TEST_All to see that it doesn’t pass. If it passes, uncomment the next test
5. If it doesn’t pass, go to the Raw property in the CTodo module and write just enough code to get the test to pass
6. When your code looks cumbersome or you see a pattern emerge, refactor Raw
7. Repeat until all the lines in TEST_All are uncommented

Check back later this week to see what I came up with.

You can download TodoTxtTestFirst.zip