Background may need clarification

[bgusach]

👓 What did you see?

According to the docs:

You can only have one set of Background steps per Feature or Rule

https://cucumber.io/docs/gherkin/reference/#background

It's not clear to me whether:

a) Both feature and rule can have a background
b) Either feature or rule can have a background, but not both.

I think it's (a), but that sentence needs clarification.

✅ What did you expect to see?

Maybe something like this?

A Feature can have only one set of Background steps. The same goes for a Rule. Both a Rule and its Feature may have a Background at the same time.

[luke-hill]

There is a historical reason for this. When we introduced Rule, we inadvertently permitted background steps in Rules. However this was semi-contentious at the time, and not universally agreed upon by the TLC.

So in essence, for now, it's a "Yes you can do it, but we don't want to recommend it". That is likely why the docs are a bit vague in this area.

[bgusach]

Does that mean that (a) is the right one?

I think it's perfectly fine to say in a reference that something is possible but not recommended—but it must be crystal clear at all costs. In other words, that paragraph could look like this?

It's possible to have a Background in a Feature, a Rule, or even both—however, this is generally discouraged.

[luke-hill]

I've moved this over to website for discussion. But I think it's something we never got a consensus on. If you want to submit a PR i'll gladly review it

[davidjgoss]

I agree we should document what it does clearly even if we don't like it much. +1 to a PR, the language in your last comment seemed good. I'd also spell out that the background steps from the feature and rule would be concatenated, just to avoid any doubt.

[luke-hill]

To clarify as well @bgusach the answer is (a). Both feature and background can have them. If just 1, use the 1, if both, use feature (background), first followed by rule (background), second