Inject TypeORM repository into NestJS service for mock data testing

Question

There's a longish discussion about how to do this in this issue.

I've experimented with a number of the proposed solutions but I'm not having much luck.

Could anyone provide a concrete example of how to test a service with an injected repository and mock data?

Answer 1

Let's assume we have a very simple service that finds a user entity by id:

export class UserService {
  constructor(@InjectRepository(UserEntity) private userRepository: Repository<UserEntity>) {
  }

  async findUser(userId: string): Promise<UserEntity> {
    return this.userRepository.findOne(userId);
  }
}

Then you can mock the UserRepository with the following mock factory (add more methods as needed):

// @ts-ignore
export const repositoryMockFactory: () => MockType<Repository<any>> = jest.fn(() => ({
  findOne: jest.fn(entity => entity),
  // ...
}));

Using a factory ensures that a new mock is used for every test.

describe('UserService', () => {
  let service: UserService;
  let repositoryMock: MockType<Repository<UserEntity>>;

  beforeEach(async () => {
    const module: TestingModule = await Test.createTestingModule({
      providers: [
        UserService,
        // Provide your mock instead of the actual repository
        { provide: getRepositoryToken(UserEntity), useFactory: repositoryMockFactory },
      ],
    }).compile();
    service = module.get<UserService>(UserService);
    repositoryMock = module.get(getRepositoryToken(UserEntity));
  });

  it('should find a user', async () => {
    const user = {name: 'Alni', id: '123'};
    // Now you can control the return value of your mock's methods
    repositoryMock.findOne.mockReturnValue(user);
    expect(service.findUser(user.id)).toEqual(user);
    // And make assertions on how often and with what params your mock's methods are called
    expect(repositoryMock.findOne).toHaveBeenCalledWith(user.id);
  });
});

For type safety and comfort you can use the following typing for your (partial) mocks (far from perfect, there might be a better solution when jest itself starts using typescript in the upcoming major releases):

export type MockType<T> = {
  [P in keyof T]?: jest.Mock<{}>;
};

Answer 2

My solution uses sqlite memory database where I insert all the needed data and create schema before every test run. So each test counts with the same set of data and you do not have to mock any TypeORM methods:

import { Test, TestingModule } from "@nestjs/testing";
import { CompanyInfo } from '../../src/company-info/company-info.entity';
import { CompanyInfoService } from "../../src/company-info/company-info.service";
import { Repository, createConnection, getConnection, getRepository } from "typeorm";
import { getRepositoryToken } from "@nestjs/typeorm";

describe('CompanyInfoService', () => {
  let service: CompanyInfoService;
  let repository: Repository<CompanyInfo>;
  let testingModule: TestingModule;

  const testConnectionName = 'testConnection';

  beforeEach(async () => {
    testingModule = await Test.createTestingModule({
      providers: [
        CompanyInfoService,
        {
          provide: getRepositoryToken(CompanyInfo),
          useClass: Repository,
        },
      ],
    }).compile();

    let connection = await createConnection({
        type: "sqlite",
        database: ":memory:",
        dropSchema: true,
        entities: [CompanyInfo],
        synchronize: true,
        logging: false,
        name: testConnectionName
    });    

    repository = getRepository(CompanyInfo, testConnectionName);
    service = new CompanyInfoService(repository);

    return connection;
  });

  afterEach(async () => {
    await getConnection(testConnectionName).close()
  });  

  it('should be defined', () => {
    expect(service).toBeDefined();
  });

  it('should return company info for findOne', async () => {
    // prepare data, insert them to be tested
    const companyInfoData: CompanyInfo = {
      id: 1,
    };

    await repository.insert(companyInfoData);

    // test data retrieval itself
    expect(await service.findOne()).toEqual(companyInfoData);
  });
});

I got inspired here: https://gist.github.com/Ciantic/be6a8b8ca27ee15e2223f642b5e01549