SKA Integration Test Harness
=============================

This repository contains two separate components:


1. The Test Harness as a Platform (versions `2.*` and later)
---------------------------------------------------------------

This is a collection of **building blocks** designed to help you create a  
**custom test harness** for integration testing your specific SKA subsystem.  
It is a **generic framework** consisting of:

- A **core package** that provides fundamental building blocks for creating  
  a test harness (action framework, configuration management, state machine
  framework, etc.).
- **Common extensions** that implement standard SKAO use cases (e.g. sending  
  **Tango Long Running Commands** and synchronising after execution).

You can take these **building blocks**, use them as-is, or extend them to  
develop your own **customised** test harness. If you are interested in this
approach, you need to use version ``2.0.0`` or later. If you are new
to this repository, we suggest you adopt this approach, as it is the one we
will maintain and develop in the long term.

More details about this approach can be found in  
:doc:`ith_as_a_platform`.

1. The Monolith TMC Test Harness (Legacy, versions `0.*`, `1.*`)
-----------------------------------------------------------------

This is a test harness for **testing TMC** in both **Mid** and **Low**.

It serves as an interface for using TMC together with controlled subsystems:  
**CSP, SDP, Dishes, and MCCS**. It is referred to as a *Monolith* because it is  
a single Python library, specifically designed for TMC, containing all the  
necessary logic for handling various testing scenarios:

- It can interface with **TMC-Mid** as well as **TMC-Low**.
- In **Mid**, it can connect to both **production** and **emulated** CSP, SDP,  
  and Dishes.
- In **Low**, it interfaces with **emulated** CSP, SDP, and MCCS.

In all cases, interactions are piloted by **TMC**.

If you need to use this test harness, you can specify version ``1.0.0`` of  
the ``ska-tmc-integration-test-harness`` package; from ``2.0.0`` onwards,
we will focus on the **Test Harness as a Platform** (see above), and the
monolithic test harness will likely be deprecated and eventually removed.
If you need to make specific modifications to the monolithic test harness,
open a branch from the ``1.0.0`` tag, and release your own patch/minor version.

For documentation on the **Monolithic TMC Test Harness**, refer to
:doc:`./legacy/index`.


.. toctree::
   :maxdepth: 2
   :caption: Contents:

   ith_as_a_platform 
   platform-concepts/index
   api
   legacy/index