Error when trying to run rspec: `require': cannot load such file -- rails_helper (LoadError)

Question

I am trying to run rspec for Ruby on Rails. I am running Rails 4.1.1. I have installed the gem, have established a spec folder with some tests. I have created a directory through $ rails g rspec:install

I tried to create a testing database through $ rake db:test:prepare but it throws this error message:

WARNING: db:test:prepare is deprecated. The Rails test helper now maintains your test  schema automatically, see the release notes for details. 

So I ended up looking at this stack overflow post, and of the two options, the one that worked was:

rake db:schema:load RAILS_ENV=test  

So, now I need to run rspec.

When I run $ rspec spec from the command line I get this error:

/Users/myname/.rbenv/versions/2.1.1/lib/ruby/2.1.0/rubygems/core_ext/ kernel_require.rb:55:in `require': cannot load such file -- rails_helper (LoadError) 

How do I resolve this so that I can start running tests?

Answer 1

There is some problem with rspec V3. But in your case you are using V2.

change

require 'rails_helper' 

to

require 'spec_helper' 

Other description find here https://teamtreehouse.com/forum/problem-with-rspec

For V3 :

If someone using rspec V3 then similar error occurs when generator not run. So before trying anything run generator.

rails generate rspec:install 

If you are getting a huge list of warning on your console. Then you need to remove --warnings from .rspec file.

Answer 2

I actually just had this error on rails 4 with rspec 3, but in my case I forgot to run the generator:

rails generate rspec:install 

Also I had to remove warnings from .rspec, as stated by one of rpsec developers