For this test scenario, we dug down deep. This type of testing can't get much closer to the hardware of the database server without directly talking to a live database.

It could be viewed that we were really testing the core of DatabaseTemplate. In many development situations, this isn't needed. Testing a 3rd party library would probably be out of scope.

This example test scenario is largely based on automated tests used to confirm Spring Python's functionality. Adequate testing for your business needs may involve stubbing or mocking out the data access layer as was shown in earlier parts of this book.

This should introduce you to the concept of mocking, where you measure method calls and answers. This type of testing may perfectly fit other test needs. If the SQL queries have been well isolated in this layer, then it may be safe to say that the only testing needed would be the queries themselves against a live database and in turn, not require any mocking or stubbing at all.