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"My method stub only works on the first RSpec example and clearing in subsequent examples, what's wrong?"
Using RSpec, it is common to mock out certain aspects of your code to change functionality for testing. This is accomplished using the "stub" method and passing the method name as a symbol.
SomeObject.stub(:some_method_to_modify).and_return do something_else() end
As we like to keep our code nice and DRY, we often pull things into "before" blocks. Unfortunately, this can cause some confusion as
describe "ObjectA" do
before :all do
ObjectB.stub!(:some_method_ObjectA_depends_on).and_return(15)
end
it "can test something" do
...
end
it "can test something else" do
Objectb.some_method_ObjectA_depends_on
end
end
will have ObjectB.some_method_ObjectA_depends_on actually executing ObjectB's method instead of stubbing. This is because after each example ("it" block), all stubs are cleared from all objects, leaving the stubs only effective in the first example.
Why aren't you using
'before :each'(which is the no-param default for'before') instead of'before :all'? This behavior makes sense to me - mocks must be cleared out after each example; having stubs do the same is logical.You can also have both
'before :all'and'before :each'blocks in your specs (see the rspec docs), so any mocking/stubbing should be done in a'before :each'.Out of curiosity, why did you need
'before :all'? I don't think I've ever needed to use it...@Chad, I don't know why the person at standup was using them, but perhaps they were doing some expensive but necessary test setup like downloading a file or doing a complex database query that must happen before the tests, but only once because the data is not modified.