Length

Supertrait for Length typeclasses.

Trait Length is a typeclass trait for objects that can be queried for length. Objects of type T for which an implicit Length[T] is available can be used with the should have length syntax. In other words, this trait enables you to use the length checking syntax with arbitrary objects. As an example, the following Bridge class:

scala> import org.scalatest._
import org.scalatest._

scala> import enablers.Length
import enablers.Length

scala> import Matchers._
import Matchers._

scala> case class Bridge(span: Int)
defined class Bridge

Out of the box you can't use the should have length syntax with Bridge, because ScalaTest doesn't know that a bridge's span means its length:

scala> val bridge = new Bridge(2000)
bridge: Bridge = Bridge(2000)

scala> bridge should have length 2000
<console>:34: error: could not find implicit value for
   parameter len: org.scalatest.enablers.Length[Bridge]
     bridge should have length 2000
                        ^

You can teach this to ScalaTest, however, by defining an implicit Length[Bridge].

scala> implicit val lengthOfBridge: Length[Bridge] =
    |   new Length[Bridge] {
    |     def lengthOf(b: Bridge): Long = b.span
    |   }
lengthOfBridge: org.scalatest.enablers.Length[Bridge] = $anon$1@3fa27a4a

With the implicit Length[Bridge] in scope, you can now use ScalaTest's should have length syntax with Bridge instances:

scala> bridge should have length 2000
res4: org.scalatest.Assertion = Succeeded

scala> bridge should have length 2001
org.scalatest.exceptions.TestFailedException: Bridge(2000) had length 2000 instead of expected length 2001
 at org.scalatest.MatchersHelper$.newTestFailedException(MatchersHelper.scala:148)
 at org.scalatest.MatchersHelper$.indicateFailure(MatchersHelper.scala:366)
 at org.scalatest.Matchers$ResultOfHaveWordForExtent.length(Matchers.scala:2720)
 ... 43 elided