How to add claims in a mock ClaimsPrincipal

Question

I am trying to unit test my controller code which gets the information from the ClaimsPrincipal.Current. In the controller code I

public class HomeController {     public ActionResult GetName() {         return Content(ClaimsPrincipal.Current.FindFirst("name").Value);     } } 

And I am trying to mock my ClaimsPrincipal with claims but I still don't have any mock value from the claim.

// Arrange IList<Claim> claimCollection = new List<Claim> {     new Claim("name", "John Doe") };  var identityMock = new Mock<ClaimsIdentity>(); identityMock.Setup(x => x.Claims).Returns(claimCollection);  var cp = new Mock<ClaimsPrincipal>(); cp.Setup(m => m.HasClaim(It.IsAny<string>(), It.IsAny<string>())).Returns(true); cp.Setup(m => m.Identity).Returns(identityMock.Object);  var sut = new HomeController();  var contextMock = new Mock<HttpContextBase>(); contextMock.Setup(ctx => ctx.User).Returns(cp.Object);  var controllerContextMock = new Mock<ControllerContext>(); controllerContextMock.Setup(con => con.HttpContext).Returns(contextMock.Object); controllerContextMock.Setup(con => con.HttpContext.User).Returns(cp.Object);  sut.ControllerContext = controllerContextMock.Object;  // Act var viewresult = sut.GetName() as ContentResult;  // Assert Assert.That(viewresult.Content, Is.EqualTo("John Doe")); 

The viewresult.Content is empty as I run the unit test. Any help if I can add the mock claim. Thanks.

Answer 1

You don't need to mock ClaimsPrincipal it has no outside dependencies and you can created it un-mocked:

var claims = new List<Claim>()  {      new Claim(ClaimTypes.Name, "username"),     new Claim(ClaimTypes.NameIdentifier, "userId"),     new Claim("name", "John Doe"), }; var identity = new ClaimsIdentity(claims, "TestAuthType"); var claimsPrincipal = new ClaimsPrincipal(identity); 

And I'm not sure what you are testing here. Certainly "John Doe" will not be part of viewResult.Content because it is never been set to this.

Answer 2

First, you are missing this line in your test:

Thread.CurrentPrincipal = cp.Object;   

(and then cleaning it up in TearDown).

Second, as @trailmax mentioned, mocking principal objects is impractical. In your case, ClaimsPrincipal.FindFirst (according to decompiled source) looks into private fields of its instance, that's the reason mocking didn't help.

I prefer using two simple classes that allow me to unit test claims-based functionality:

    public class TestPrincipal : ClaimsPrincipal     {         public TestPrincipal(params Claim[] claims) : base(new TestIdentity(claims))         {         }     }      public class TestIdentity : ClaimsIdentity     {         public TestIdentity(params Claim[] claims) : base(claims)         {         }     } 

then your test shrinks down to:

    [Test]     public void TestGetName()     {         // Arrange         var sut = new HomeController();         Thread.CurrentPrincipal = new TestPrincipal(new Claim("name", "John Doe"));          // Act         var viewresult = sut.GetName() as ContentResult;          // Assert         Assert.That(viewresult.Content, Is.EqualTo("John Doe"));     } 

and it now passes, I've just verified.