Purposes of Unit Testing

1. As a development process
   Test-driven development is a useful skill to learn. It encourages a clean design, as writing unit tests for messy design is both painful to write and painful to maintain. It also gives a target to code against, by setting what what the function ought to achieve before the function is even written.


2. Proving the code behaves correctly
   Writing unit tests is the simplest way to show that code does what it is meant to do. Unit tests allow easy checking of boundary conditions, to ensure that the function behaves as expected.


3. Demonstrating robustness
   In complex systems, well-written unit tests demonstrate that functions behave as expected. As more features are added, or as code is reused, unit tests demonstrate that these changes do not affect the existing functionality. Conversely, if unit tests easily brake when code changes, it's a good indicator of fragility.


4. Testing
   Some tests algorithms are better for than humans. When testing a function involves a large amount of data, unit tests are best equipped for this job. This is also true for time-dependent functions, or testing algorithms.


5. Refactoring
   Unit tests provide the assurance needed that refactoring the codebase hasn't accidentally changed functionality. Without unit tests, refactoring is fraught with risk.