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+# Assertion Macros
+
+Most test frameworks have a large collection of assertion macros to capture all possible conditional forms (```_EQUALS```, ```_NOTEQUALS```, ```_GREATER_THAN``` etc).
+
+Catch is different. Because it decomposes natural C-style conditional expressions most of these forms are reduced to one or two that you will use all the time. That said there are a rich set of auxilliary macros as well. We'll describe all of these here.
+
+Most of these macros come in two forms:
+
+## Natural Expressions
+
+The ```REQUIRE``` family of macros tests an expression and aborts the test case if it fails.
+The ```CHECK``` family are equivalent but execution continues in the same test case even if the assertion fails. This is useful if you have a series of essentially orthogonal assertions and it is useful to see all the results rather than stopping at the first failure.
+
+* **REQUIRE(** _expression_ **)** and  
+* **CHECK(** _expression_ **)**
+
+Evaluates the expression and records the result. If an exception is thrown it is caught, reported, and counted as a failure. These are the macros you will use most of  the time
+
+Examples:
+```
+CHECK( str == "string value" );
+CHECK( thisReturnsTrue() );
+REQUIRE( i == 42 );
+```
+
+* **REQUIRE_FALSE(** _expression_ **)** and  
+* **CHECK_FALSE(** _expression_ **)**
+
+Evaluates the expression and records the _logical NOT_ of the result. If an exception is thrown it is caught, reported, and counted as a failure.
+(these forms exist as a workaround for the fact that ! prefixed expressions cannot be decomposed).
+
+Example:
+```
+REQUIRE_FALSE( thisReturnsFalse() );
+```
+
+### Floating point comparisons
+
+When comparing floating point numbers - especially if at least one of them has been computed - great care must be taken to allow for rounding errors and inexact representations.
+
+Catch provides a way to perform tolerant comparisons of floating point values through use of a wrapper class called ```Approx```. ```Approx``` can be used on either side of a comparison expression. It overloads the comparisons operators to take a tolerance into account. Here's a simple example:
+
+```
+REQUIRE( performComputation() == Approx( 2.1 ) );
+```
+
+By default a small epsilon value is used that covers many simple cases of rounding errors. When this is insufficent the epsilon value (the amount within which a difference either way is ignored) can be specified by calling the ```epsilon()``` method on the ```Approx``` instance. e.g.:
+
+```
+REQUIRE( 22/7 == Approx( 3.141 ).epsilon( 0.01 ) );
+```
+
+When dealing with very large or very small numbers it can be useful to specify a scale, which can be achieved by calling the ```scale()``` method on the ```Approx``` instance.
+
+## Exceptions
+
+* **REQUIRE_THROWS(** _expression_ **)** and  
+* **CHECK_THROWS(** _expression_ **)**
+
+Expects that an exception (of any type) is be thrown during evaluation of the expression.
+
+* **REQUIRE_THROWS_AS(** _expression_, _exception type_ **)** and  
+* **CHECK_THROWS_AS(** _expression_, _exception type_ **)**
+
+Expects that an exception of the _specified type_ is thrown during evaluation of the expression.
+
+* **REQUIRE_NOTHROW(** _expression_ **)** and  
+* **CHECK_NOTHROW(** _expression_ **)**
+
+Expects that no exception is thrown during evaluation of the expression.
+
+## Matcher expressions
+
+To support Matchers a slightly different form is used. Matchers will be more fully documented elsewhere. *Note that Matchers are still at early stage development and are subject to change.*
+
+* **REQUIRE_THAT(** _lhs_, _matcher call_ **)** and  
+* **CHECK_THAT(** _lhs_, _matcher call_ **)**  
+
+
+---
+
+[Home](Readme.md)
+\ No newline at end of file