parsing-gherkin-scenarios

name	parsing-gherkin-scenarios
description	Use when validating BDD feature files - extract scenarios, detect chunk filtering mode, classify positive vs negative scenarios

Parsing Gherkin Scenarios

Overview

Parse .feature files and structure scenarios for validation. Detect @chunk mode (run subset) vs full (all scenarios). Classify each scenario by type (@positive, @negative, or untagged) and extract step details (Given/When/Then).

When to Use

• First step in IDD validation pipeline
• Loading a .feature file for analysis
• Need to identify which scenarios to validate (chunk vs full mode)

Core Process

Step 1: Chunk Mode Detection (FIRST operation)

Finding	Behavior
Any @chunk tag found	Mode = "chunk" → retain ONLY @chunk scenarios
No @chunk tags	Mode = "full" → retain all scenarios

Log result: "Mode: [chunk|full] | X scenarios retained"

Step 2: Extract Each Scenario

For every retained scenario, extract:

{
  "name": "exact scenario name from file",
  "type": "positive | negative | untagged",
  "tags": ["@chunk", "@positive", "@negative"],
  "steps": {
    "given": ["step text"],
    "when": ["step text"],
    "then": ["step text"]
  },
  "is_chunk": true,
  "raw_text": "full scenario block verbatim"
}

Step 3: Validate Tags

Every scenario must have @positive OR @negative tag:

• Both present → type = "positive" or "negative"
• Neither present → type = "untagged"
• Mark untagged scenarios for validator (will fail validation)

Hard Constraints

• @chunk filtering is the FIRST operation — before parsing, before any analysis
• If mode = chunk: non-@chunk scenarios are INVISIBLE. Do not count, reference, or analyze them.
• Scenario count in output must reflect only retained scenarios

Output

Structured scenario list ready for scope-resolver and code-mapper.