MSTEST0066: [Ignore] should specify a justification

Property	Value
Rule ID	MSTEST0066
Title	[Ignore] should specify a justification
Category	Design
Fix is breaking or non-breaking	Non-breaking
Enabled by default	Yes
Default severity	Info
Introduced in version	4.3.0
Is there a code fix	No

Note

This rule is available starting with MSTest 4.3.

Cause

A test method or test class is marked with IgnoreAttribute but no justification message is provided.

Rule description

To improve the discoverability and triage of skipped tests, an [Ignore] attribute applied to a test method or test class should include a non-empty message explaining why the test or class is ignored. A justification message helps reviewers understand the intent and prevents tests from being silently disabled forever.

[TestClass]
public class TestClass
{
    [TestMethod]
    [Ignore] // Violation - no justification provided.
    public void Test()
    {
    }
}

How to fix violations

Pass a non-empty message to the [Ignore] attribute, either positionally or via the IgnoreMessage named property:

[TestClass]
public class TestClass
{
    [TestMethod]
    [Ignore("Disabled until issue #1234 is fixed.")]
    public void Test()
    {
    }
}

[TestClass]
[Ignore(IgnoreMessage = "Disabled until issue #1234 is fixed.")]
public class TestClass
{
    [TestMethod]
    public void Test()
    {
    }
}

When to suppress warnings

Don't suppress warnings from this rule. Ignored tests without a justification are easy to forget.

Suppress a warning

If you just want to suppress a single violation, add preprocessor directives to your source file to disable and then re-enable the rule.

#pragma warning disable MSTEST0066
// The code that's violating the rule is on this line.
#pragma warning restore MSTEST0066

To disable the rule for a file, folder, or project, set its severity to none in the configuration file.

[*.{cs,vb}]
dotnet_diagnostic.MSTEST0066.severity = none

For more information, see How to suppress code analysis warnings.