Eager loading has some unexpected side effects on Model events/ booting in Laravel

Question

I'm trying to create some tests.

Here's my Test Class:

class ExampleTest extends TestCase {

    public function setUp()
    {
        parent::setUp();
        Artisan::call('migrate');
        $this->seed();
        Auth::loginUsingId(1);
    }
    public function testActionUpdateNew()
    {
        $action = new Action(Array());
        $action->save();
        var_dump($action->id);
        Action::with('reponses','contact','user','etudiant','entreprise','etude')->findOrFail($action->id);
    }
    public function testEtudes()
    {
        $etudes=Etude::all()->toArray();
        $this->assertCount(10, $etudes, "Nombre d'études incorrectes");
        $numEtudes=count($etudes);
        //Buggy part
        $etude= Etude::create(Array());
        var_dump($etude->id);
        $etudes=Etude::all()->toArray();
        $this->assertCount(11, $etudes, "Nombre d'études incorrectes");
        //10+1 should equal to 11 but it hasnt updated
    }
}

The test that is not passing is the second one: I count the number of eloquent Objects Etudes, which are of 10 at the beginning, I then add one etude to the database (using Etude::create()) , the object is created, because $etude->id gives out a real number. Howewer, the number of Etude hasn't updated.

The problem does go away when I remove the 'etude' from the eager loading in Action::with('reponses',...)

Here is the etudes relationship in the Action class:

public function etude() {
    return $this->belongsTo('Etude');
}

Do you guys have any idea if eager-loading in laravel can have such strange behavior and how to fix that ?

EDIT

I found out that calling with('etude') had the action to remove the events registered to the Eloquent Model:

boot Method of Etude:

public static function boot()
{
    parent::boot();

    static::creating(function($etude)
        {
                       var_dump("creating etude"); //This doesn't get executed even when I run Etude::create(Array());
        }
    );
}

So If I add Etude::boot() at the beginning of testEtudes, it works again. This is still strange.

Does eager loading has any effect on events or the boot method ? Or is the boot method not called automatically after each test ?

Answer 1

In Laravel tests, the event dispatcher is reset between each test, but the models are still only booted once as they live a pretty independent life. This means that between each test, the model listeners are erased but never re-registered. The solution is to not use boot() for registering model events, but rather but them in a separate file - either a service provider or a file included from app/start/global.php (app/events.php is a common one).