Testcontainers for Neo4j

Introduction

Testcontainers is a Java library that provides lightweight, disposable instances of common databases, including Neo4j, for testing purposes. It allows you to run tests against a real Neo4j database instance within a Docker container, ensuring that your tests are reliable and consistent.

Installation

To use Testcontainers with Neo4j, follow these steps:

1. Add the Testcontainers dependency to your Maven or Gradle project. For Maven, include the following in your `pom.xml`:

<dependency>
    <groupId>org.testcontainers</groupId>
    <artifactId>testcontainers</artifactId>
    <version>1.17.0</version>
    <scope>test</scope>
</dependency>

1. For Gradle, add the following to your `build.gradle`:

testImplementation 'org.testcontainers:testcontainers:1.17.0'

Usage

Now that you have Testcontainers installed, you can create a test class that initializes a Neo4j container:

import org.junit.jupiter.api.Test;
import org.testcontainers.containers.Neo4jContainer;

class MyNeo4jTest {

    private static final Neo4jContainer neo4jContainer =
            new Neo4jContainer<>("neo4j:latest")
                    .withPassword("password");

    static {
        neo4jContainer.start();
    }

    @Test
    void testSomething() {
        // Your test code here, using neo4jContainer.getBoltUrl() to connect to the database.
    }
}

Best Practices

Here are some best practices when using Testcontainers with Neo4j:

• Use specific Neo4j versions in your container to avoid unexpected changes.
• Clean up resources after tests by stopping the container.
• Leverage Docker Compose for complex setups involving multiple containers.

FAQ