Ask HN: Do you guys still write test cases for your MVPs or hobby projects?

Most of the time. I program in Java so tests and ide are my repl.

Not if I am just exploring a new language or libraries. Yes if it is meant to be a complete piece of software.

Yes. Especially if it's a shared project - then I'm reasonably sure that it's me who introduced a bug, and not the others ;)

MVPs? Absolutely. Just because it's the first iteration doesn't mean it's not important to test that everything in that first iteration works.

Hobby projects? Less so, particularly if it's just me writing software. However, if I'm writing a particularly hairy piece of logic I'll absolutely write some tests for it (for example, I wrote a JS calendar plugin just to see if I could do better than the many existing ones, and I did all of the date logic myself using JS's terrible Date library).

I try to write effective tests that really help me out without being too constraining or tedious.

When I go back to fix something or refactor old code, I know what an anxious experience it is to do that without test coverage, so having a basic test suite makes me happy.

If I've spent the time to learn the testing framework, I'll use it for hobby projects.

Yup. I get bored of click through testing pretty quickly.

If I intend to share or build upon it, yes.

If I'm exploring an idea that I know is throwaway and won't be foundational for anything else, no.

Yes. It's a bit hard to do so for games, but doing so makes it SOOOOOOO much easier to port if you have to. After all a test is basically a port to a system that has a different graphical, windowing & input system (none, none, & simulated).

My friend shared tons of details in how he tested his future wife for possibility of long lasting relationship.

They got divorced 1 yr after marriage.

So much for writing a test cases. Follow your intuition.