Perhaps it is my lack of familiarity with rspec but i do not understand what is going on with my test.
I have 2 classes one called Scrape, the other Result (creative) Scrape is a web scraping class that searches a site and scrapes the results from the page, creating a new Result instance from each.
Result instances are stored in a class variable array accessible via Result.all
this works in practice in the actual program, however when I tried to write a test for this behavior it fails.
describe "#scrape_results" do
it "accepts a url scrapes the page and creates a Result for each" do
s = Scrape.new
s.scrape_results(#url)
expect(Result.all.count).not_to eq(0)
end
end
every time i run the test Result.all.count is 0
if i use pry and manually run #scrape_results the test passes.
I appreciate your time, patience, and help
thanks
I notice that you are passing #url to #scrape_results in your test. Unless you are defining that variable inside of the describe block or the test block it will be nil in your test. It is possible that since #url might be something other than nil from wherever you are pry-ing which is causing the Result to be created and the test to pass.
Related
I find mocking things with RSpec to be entirely problematic and I often don't know how much code to include, in terms of it being diagnostic. So I'll start with the situation I have and the code that I've isolated as causing the problem.
I have tests where I need to mock a browser. I have a mock driver I set up like this:
require "watir"
def mock_driver
browser = double("watir")
allow(browser).to receive(:is_a?).with(Watir::Browser).and_return(true)
allow(browser).to receive(:driver).and_return(true)
browser
end
The only problems I have in my test suite are these two tests:
context "an empiric driver is requested" do
it "a watir browser is provided" do
allow(Watir::Browser).to receive(:new).and_return(Empiric.browser)
Empiric.set_browser mock_driver
end
it "the requested watir browser can be shut down" do
#allow(Empiric.browser).to receive(:quit)
Empiric.quit_browser
#allow(mock_browser).to receive(:new).and_return(Empiric.browser)
#Empiric.set_browser mock_driver
end
end
(The commented out bits in the second test are on purpose to illustrate what's going on.)
With that one line in place in the second test, I get the following error on that test:
<Double "watir"> was originally created in one example but has leaked into another
example and can no longer be used. rspec-mocks' doubles are designed to only last for
one example, and you need to create a new one in each example you wish to use it for.
If I entirely comment out the first test above, that error doesn't happen so I know I've isolated the two tests that are interacting with each other.
Okay, now notice the final line of my second test that is commented out. That seems to be what the error is indicating to me. It's saying I need to create a new double in the other. Okay, so I'll change my last test:
it "the requested watir browser can be shut down" do
#allow(Empiric.browser).to receive(:quit)
Empiric.quit_browser
#allow(mock_browser).to receive(:new).and_return(Empiric.browser)
Empiric.set_browser mock_driver
end
So here I've uncommented the last line so I'm establishing the mock_driver in that test and not allowing the code to leak.
That, however, returns exactly the same error on exactly the same test.
I'm not sure if it would help to see the methods that are being called in that test, but here they are. First is set_browser:
def set_browser(app = :chrome, *args)
#browser = Watir::Browser.new(app, *args)
Empiric.browser = #browser
end
And here is quit_browser:
def quit_browser
#browser.quit
end
The fact that RSpec thought one test was "leaking" into the other made me think that perhaps my #browser instance was the problem, essentially being what's persisting between the two tests. But I don't see how to get around that. I thought that maybe if I quit the browser in the first test, that would help. So I changed the first test to this:
it "a watir browser is provided" do
Empiric.quit_browser
allow(Watir::Browser).to receive(:new).and_return(Empiric.browser)
Empiric.start_browser mock_driver
end
That, however, led to the above error being shown on both tests now.
My more likely accurate guess is that I simply don't know how to provide a mock in this context.
I think you have to use allow with the mock and not Watir::Browser.
For example, what happens if you allow the mock browser to receive whatever calls the browser would and have the it return the mock browser?
Right now you're allowing the "Watir::Browser" to receive those messages and that's returning an "Empiric.browser". Looking at your code, I understand why you put that in there but I think that might be what's screwing you up here.
Mocks in RSpec are horrible things that rarely if ever work correctly in situations like this. I would entirely recommend not using the mock_driver that you have set up. Rather, for each of your tests just do something similar to what you are doing in the mock_driver. My guess is you're including the mock driver as part of a shared context and that, too, is another thing that is very fragile in RSpec. Not recommended.
Instead you might want to use contexts to break up your tests. Then for each context block have a before block. I'm not sure if you should use before:all or before:each given that you're simulating a browser. But that way you can set up the browser in the before and tear it down in an after.
But I would recommend getting it working in each test individually first. Even if it's a lot of code duplication. Then once all tests are passing, refactor to put the browser stuff in those before/after blocks.
But, again, don't use mocks. Don't use shared contexts. It never ends well and honestly it makes your tests harder to reason about.
Given some advice from Micah, I wanted to provide an answer with a solution. I ended up doing this:
context "an empiric driver is requested" do
it "a watir browser is provided" do
allow(Watir::Browser).to receive(:new).and_return(Empiric.browser)
allow(Empiric.browser).to receive(:driver).and_return(true)
expect { Empiric.start_browser :some_browser }.not_to raise_error
end
it "the requested watir browser can be shut down" do
allow(Empiric.browser).to receive(:quit)
allow(Watir::Browser).to receive(:new).and_return(Empiric.browser)
allow(Empiric.browser).to receive(:driver).and_return(true)
expect { Empiric.quit_browser }.not_to raise_error
end
end
All of that was needed as it is or I would get some error or other. I removed my mock driver and, per Micah's suggestion, simply tried to incorporate what seemed to work. The above "contraption" is what I ended up with as the sweet spot.
This works in the sense of giving coverage of the methods in question. What was interesting was that I had to add this to my RSpec configuration:
RSpec.configure do |config|
config.mock_with :rspec do |mocks|
mocks.allow_message_expectations_on_nil = true
end
end
I needed to do this because RSpec was reporting that I was calling allowing something that was nil to receive a value.
This brought up some interesting things, if you think about it. I have a test that is clearly passing. And it adds to my code coverage. But is it actually testing the quit action on a browser? Well, not really since it was testing a quit action on something that it thought was nil.
But -- it does work. And it must be calling the lines of code in question because the code coverage, as reported my SimpleCov, indicates that the statements in question have been checked.
I'm working on some unit tests. One of them use a specific configuration variable as set in my application MyBigApp::Env which looks like:
{:country=>'uk', :another_hosts=>["192.168.99.105"]}
So I access it with MyBigApp::Env.country
However in my unit test I want that country for the test become something.
Using rspec I've seen stub but can't get it to work - any ideas where I'm going wrong:
MyBigApp::Env.stub(:[]).with('country').and_return('gr')
Also tried this (as above shows deprecated):
allow(MyBigApp::Env).to receive('country').and_return('gr')
Infact as a test, I also tried:
my_hash = {:uri=>nil}
allow(my_hash).to receive(:[]).with(:uri).and_return('Over written!')
p my_hash
and that didnt update either - it just returned {:uri=>nil}
As a workaround, at the moment I'm having to save the env var in a temp var in the before(each) block then return it back to the original in the after(each). This feels really risky to me. I'm thinking imagine the service running and someone runs unit tests it could effect the end user in that small instance the test is running.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
Yes it possible, but keep in mind that stub only works when you trigger/call the method that you stubbed/mocked
my_hash = {:uri=>nil}
allow(my_hash).to receive(:[]).with(:uri).and_return('Over written!')
p my_hash[:url] # it will be 'Over written!'
This works for me:
my_hash = {:uri=>nil}
allow(my_hash).to receive(:[]).with(:uri).and_return('Over written!')
expect(my_hash[:uri]).to eq "Over written!"
In your sample test case, you are just calling p my_hash which doesn't actually call the [] method.
In terms of why this isn't working with MyBigApp::Env, well, that really depends on what class it is. Possible whatever method .country is doesn't actually call [].
Really, if you call MyBigApp::Env['country'] and stub MyBigApp::Env to receive [] with 'country', it should work.
In regards to your concern about changing your running application's behavior from the tests ... what kind of tests are these?! Running unit tests against a live production application would be very odd. How do you imagine it would change your production app's code? The Env hash just lives in memory right?
Anyway, you should never have to worry about your tests changing the experience for an 'end user'. Always run tests on a completely quarantined envionment, meaning don't use the same database. Actually, the test database is usually wiped after each test.
Just wanted to suggest a non-stubbing alternative. For example:
def code_under_test
key = 'country'
# ... maybe lots of code
value = MyBigApp::Env[key] # deep inside some classes
# ... lots more code
"This is the #{value}"
end
MyBigApp::Env is hard-coded deep in the code, and the need for stubbing reveals that dependency, and the benefits of OOP encapsulation are lost.
It'd be much easier if this were the case:
def code_under_test(config_vars = MyBigApp::Env)
"This is the #{config_vars['country']}"
end
it 'should return my country value' do
value = previous_code_under_test('country' => 'TEST VALUE')
expect(value).to eq("This is the TEST VALUE")
end
No stubbing required, just plain old method calls.
I have a simple test in an RSpec controller spec that checks to see if the correct message was passed to a delayed job:
it 'sends a message to NotifyFollowersJob with relevant person and split_time data' do
allow(NotifyFollowersJob).to receive(:perform_later)
post :import, params: request_params
split_time_ids = SplitTime.all.ids
person_id = SplitTime.first.effort.person_id
expect(NotifyFollowersJob).to have_received(:perform_later)
.with(person_id: person_id,
split_time_ids: split_time_ids)
end
The test usually passes, but sometimes it fails because the split_time_ids (an Array) are sometimes reversed. I do not care what order the split_time_ids are passed to NotifyFollowersJob, so the test should pass regardless of the order.
If I were testing the contents of the Array alone, I could write:
expect(split_time_ids).to match_array(SplitTime.all.ids)
But I can't figure out how to get similar functionality where the Array is a value of one of several arguments.
Any RSpec masters out there care to give me some guidance?
One idea is to make a block to check the message and pass it to your allow method.
Like this:
allow(NotifyFollowersJob).to receive(:perform_later) do |arg|
# Handle your args to avoid fails because of its order
expect(...)
end
And you should keep the expect(NotifyFollowersJob).to have_received(:perform_later) (without the with verification) just to make sure it is still being called.
It looks like your controller action runs SplitTime.all.ids query and passes them to the worker as args.
If you don't care about the order, maybe you can stub this query, to get the same result all the time?
In addition, it'll make your test faster.
I am new to mocha gem before that I am using minitest to test my product. Then I came across a situation where my application is publishing jobs to facebook. It selects some jobs and then publish them on facebook.
So somebody told me to use mocking and i found mocha gem.
I see a sample test.
def test_mocking_an_instance_method_on_a_real_object
job = Job.new
job.expects(:save).returns(true)
assert job.save
end
But I did not get the idea. In my jobs controller, I have validations
and the empty job cannot be saved successfully. But here with mocking the
above test assert that job can be saved without mandatory fields.So what exactly we test in above test case?
It is a good practice generally for several reasons:
From an isolation point of view: The responsibility of the controller is to handle the incoming request and trigger actions accordingly. In our given case the actions are: create a new Job, and issue a new post to Facebook if everything fits. (Please notice our controller doesn't need to know about how to post to FB)
So imagine the following controller action:
def create
job = Job.new job_params
if job.save
FacebookService.post_job job
...
else
...
end
end
I would test it like:
class JobsControllerTest < ActionController::TestCase
test "should create a job and issue new FB post" do
job_params = { title: "Job title" }
# We expect the post_job method will be called on the FacebookService class or module, and we replace the original implementation with an 'empty/mock' method that does nothing
FacebookService.expects :post_job
post :create, job_params
assert_equal(Job.count, 1) # or similar
assert_response :created
end
end
The other advantage is: FacebookService.post_job might take significant time, and might require internet access etc, we don't want our tests to pending on those, especially if we have CI.
And finally I would test the real FB posting in the FacebookService test, and maybe stub out some other method, to prevent posting on FB every single time when the test runs (it needs time, internet, FB account...).
I am using Cheezy's PageObject to setup some cucumber tests. I have everything pretty much setup like Jeff Morgan's book "Cucumber & Cheese".
Right now I have a page object "PublishPage" setup that has a method that sets a variable #tag. For example I have in the file publish_page.rb
Class PublishPage
def tag
#some steps left out
#tag = "123"
end
def verify_tag
#some steps left out
#tag.should include "2"
end
end
In the Cucumber steps, for one of the steps i have on_page(PublishPage).tag, and then in another step i have on_page(PublishPage).verify_tag. In my env.rb file I have require 'rspec-expectations'.
The problem is that when I run this code I get an error that says undefined method 'include' for #<PublishPage:xxxxxx>. But if I move the code inside the verify_tag method into the steps everything works except it does not have access to #tag...
This should be as simple as adding
include RSpec::Matchers
to your page object.
The other alternative would be to expose #tag through some method and then in your Cucumber step say something like
on_page(PublishPage).the_displayed_tag.should include("2")
Every time you invoke on_page(PublishPage), it will instantiate a new page object. You are most likely getting the "cannot convert nil to string" error because you are referencing an instance variable from a new object, hence it's value being nil. You should no longer get that error if you instantiate your page object only once, between calling page.tag and page.verify_tag.
Doing things this way will use one instance of your page object, allowing you to persist between step definitions.
When /I publish a tag/ do
#on_page(PublishPage).tag
#publish_page = PublishPage.new #browser
#publish_page.tag
end
Then /I should have my tag/ do
#publish_page.verify_tag
end
Hope this helps!