testing effective dates

This description is similar to the application we are testing:

1. the employee has an effective date and an expiration date
2. the employee is assigned to a department
3. each department has an effective date and an expiration date
4. the employee is assigned a badge with an effective date and an expiration date
5. the department is the top level item, then employee, and finally badge

Effective dates of the child items should be within the start and end dates of the parent item. The application is not enforcing this rule, so these dates are allowed:

Department  1/1/2009-1/1/3000
Employee     1/1/2001-1/31/2001
Badge          1/1/2005-12/31/2006

In the real application each field also has a bit field called Blocked to temporarily shut off the ability to use each item. These bit fields are Nullable, which is wrong.  Blocked shouldn't affect the effective dates.

If you deactivate the top level item it should inactivate all child items. When an item is deactivated it sets the expiration date to today.

There is also a rule that says effective date cannot be after the expiration date  - sounds like bad news for these dates:

Department  1/1/2009-11/1/2010
Employee     1/1/2011-1/1/3000
Badge          1/1/2011-1/1/3000

After deactivating the Department Employee and Badge will generate the error message "End date cannot be before start date" and the effective dates are out of order for employee and badge:

Department  1/1/2009-10/22/2010
Employee     1/1/2011-10/22/2010
Badge          1/1/2011-10/22/2010