TESTING.md

@@ -2,8 +2,10 @@
 
 ## DNS Resolution Tests
 
-All resolver tests **MUST** use live queries against real DNS servers.
-No mocking of the DNS client layer is permitted.
+All tests that involve DNS resolution — in every package, including
+consumers of the resolver such as the watcher — **MUST** use live
+queries against real DNS servers. No mocking, faking, or stubbing of
+DNS at any layer is permitted.
 
 ### Rationale
 
@@ -12,6 +14,8 @@ the full delegation chain. Mocked responses cannot faithfully represent
 the variety of real-world DNS behavior (truncation, referrals, glue
 records, DNSSEC, varied response times, EDNS, etc.). Testing against
 real servers ensures the resolver works correctly in production.
+Robustness comes from handling real-world DNS behavior with tolerant
+assertions and sensible timeouts, not from mocks.
 
 ### Constraints
 
@@ -24,11 +28,14 @@ real servers ensures the resolver works correctly in production.
 - Flaky failures from transient network issues are acceptable and
   should be investigated as potential resolver bugs, not papered over
   with mocks or skip flags
+- Watcher change-detection tests seed a synthetic *previous state*
+  and compare it against fresh live lookups; the DNS side is never
+  faked
 
 ### What NOT to do
 
-- **Do not mock `DNSClient`** for resolver tests (the mock constructor
-  exists for unit-testing other packages that consume the resolver)
+- **Do not mock `DNSClient`**, the watcher's `DNSResolver` interface,
+  or any other DNS abstraction — in any package, for any reason
 - **Do not add `-short` flags** to skip slow tests
 - **Do not increase `-timeout`** to hide hanging queries
 - **Do not modify linter configuration** to suppress findings

TODO.md

@@ -14,7 +14,10 @@ pre-1.0. No git tags. Core resolver work in flight on feature/resolver
 (dirty: internal/resolver/resolver_test.go). Local checkout has diverged
 from origin: origin/main is 8 commits ahead (watcher orchestrator,
 unified TARGETS) and origin/feature/resolver already contains the full
-iterative resolver implementation with hermetic mocked tests.
+iterative resolver implementation. DNS mocking is banned in this repo
+(see `TESTING.md`): all tests use live DNS only. The hermetic mocked
+tests previously noted on `feature/resolver` are gone from its current
+tip, which carries a live-DNS suite against `*.dns.sneak.cloud`.
 
 # Next Step
 
@@ -25,10 +28,15 @@ confirm make check still passes.
 
 # Completed Steps
 
+- 2026-08-07: DNS mocking removed from the entire test suite; watcher
+  tests now drive the real iterative resolver against live DNS and
+  `TESTING.md` bans DNS mocks in every package (`remove-dns-mocking`
+  branch)
 - 2026-07-07 Adopted scripts-to-rule-them-all: `script/` entrypoints,
   Makefile shims, README Entrypoints section
 - 2026-02-20: iterative DNS resolver implemented; tests made hermetic
-  with mocked DNS (origin/feature/resolver, unmerged)
+  with mocked DNS (origin/feature/resolver, unmerged; superseded — DNS
+  mocking is banned, see `TESTING.md`)
 - 2026-02-20: CI actions and go install refs pinned to commit SHAs;
   Gitea Actions workflow for make check (origin/ci/make-check, unmerged)
 - 2026-02-20: watcher monitoring orchestrator merged to main (#8)
@@ -55,8 +63,9 @@ Branch reconciliation:
 - Sync local checkout with origin: local main is 8 commits behind
   origin/main; local feature/resolver has diverged from
   origin/feature/resolver, which already implements the resolver
-- Merge in-flight branches to main once green: feature/resolver,
-  ci/make-check, feature/portcheck-implementation,
+- Merge in-flight branches to main once green: feature/resolver
+  (confirm its tests remain live-DNS — DNS mocking is banned, see
+  `TESTING.md`), ci/make-check, feature/portcheck-implementation,
   feature/tlscheck-implementation
 
 Resolver (plan from untracked TODO.md; largely implemented on
@@ -140,6 +149,7 @@ Infrastructure notes (from untracked TODO.md):
 - Module path sneak.berlin/go/dnswatcher differs from the git.eeqj.de
   remote intentionally; do not "fix" it
 - Dependencies: github.com/miekg/dns, golang.org/x/net/publicsuffix
-- Resolver tests originally used live DNS against *.dns.sneak.cloud
-  (required records documented in the test file header); origin now has
-  mocked hermetic tests, keep them hermetic
+- Resolver tests originally used live DNS against `*.dns.sneak.cloud`
+  (required records documented in the test file header); `main` now
+  tests against live public DNS. DNS mocking is banned (see
+  `TESTING.md`); never reintroduce hermetic mocked DNS tests

internal/resolver/dns_client.go

@@ -7,8 +7,8 @@ import (
 	"github.com/miekg/dns"
 )
 
-// DNSClient abstracts DNS wire-protocol exchanges so the resolver
-// can be tested without hitting real nameservers.
+// DNSClient abstracts DNS wire-protocol exchanges over a single
+// transport, letting the resolver switch between UDP and TCP.
 type DNSClient interface {
 	ExchangeContext(
 		ctx context.Context,

internal/resolver/resolver.go

@@ -67,17 +67,4 @@ func NewFromLogger(log *slog.Logger) *Resolver {
 	}
 }
 
-// NewFromLoggerWithClient creates a Resolver with a custom DNS
-// client, useful for testing with mock DNS responses.
-func NewFromLoggerWithClient(
-	log *slog.Logger,
-	client DNSClient,
-) *Resolver {
-	return &Resolver{
-		log:    log,
-		client: client,
-		tcp:    client,
-	}
-}
-
 // Method implementations are in iterative.go.

internal/resolver/resolver_test.go

@@ -10,7 +10,6 @@ import (
 	"testing"
 	"time"
 
-	"github.com/miekg/dns"
 	"github.com/stretchr/testify/assert"
 	"github.com/stretchr/testify/require"
 
@@ -624,58 +623,41 @@ func TestQueryAllNameservers_ContextCanceled(t *testing.T) {
 }
 
 // ----------------------------------------------------------------
-// Timeout tests
+// Unreachable nameserver tests
 // ----------------------------------------------------------------
 
-func TestQueryNameserverIP_Timeout(t *testing.T) {
+func TestQueryNameserverIP_UnreachableServer(t *testing.T) {
 	t.Parallel()
 
-	log := slog.New(slog.NewTextHandler(
-		os.Stderr,
-		&slog.HandlerOptions{Level: slog.LevelDebug},
-	))
-
-	r := resolver.NewFromLoggerWithClient(
-		log, &timeoutClient{},
-	)
+	r := newTestResolver(t)
 
 	ctx, cancel := context.WithTimeout(
 		context.Background(), 10*time.Second,
 	)
 	t.Cleanup(cancel)
 
-	// Query any IP — the client always returns a timeout error.
+	// 192.0.2.1 is an RFC 5737 documentation address: no
+	// nameserver can exist there. Depending on the network
+	// path the queries either time out (silent drop) or fail
+	// fast (ICMP unreachable), so accept any non-OK status;
+	// the resolver must return a classified response with no
+	// records rather than an error or a hang.
 	resp, err := r.QueryNameserverIP(
 		ctx, "unreachable.test.", "192.0.2.1",
 		"example.com",
 	)
 	require.NoError(t, err)
 
-	assert.Equal(t, resolver.StatusTimeout, resp.Status)
-	assert.NotEmpty(t, resp.Error)
-}
+	assert.NotEqual(t, resolver.StatusOK, resp.Status)
 
-// timeoutClient simulates DNS timeout errors for testing.
-type timeoutClient struct{}
-
-func (c *timeoutClient) ExchangeContext(
-	_ context.Context,
-	_ *dns.Msg,
-	_ string,
-) (*dns.Msg, time.Duration, error) {
-	return nil, 0, &net.OpError{
-		Op:  "read",
-		Net: "udp",
-		Err: &timeoutError{},
+	totalRecords := 0
+	for _, values := range resp.Records {
+		totalRecords += len(values)
 	}
+
+	assert.Zero(t, totalRecords)
 }
 
-type timeoutError struct{}
-
-func (e *timeoutError) Error() string   { return "i/o timeout" }
-func (e *timeoutError) Timeout() bool   { return true }
-func (e *timeoutError) Temporary() bool { return true }
-
 func TestResolveIPAddresses_ContextCanceled(t *testing.T) {
 	t.Parallel()