The recommended way to develop ebcl_build_tools is using the devcontainer. It can used by loading the workspace into vscode and executing the command "Dev Containers: Reopen in Container". This will download the dev container that contains all required tools, install useful extensions (python, flake8, mypy, robot framework and pytest) and setup a virtual environment for development.
The pytests are mostly unit tests but cross over into integration tests for some modules.
Some of these tests download packages from debian repositories. They should be marked with @pytest.mark.requires_download.
Test can be executed using ptest, either on the command line or using the testing integration.
The robot framework tests are black box integration tests. They take a long time to execute and download files from debian repositories.
To execute the tests either the robot command line utility or the vscode integration can be used.