RSpec test PUT update action

Question

I am trying to write some RSpec tests to test my app, but I've stumbled on several problems that I can't find any solution. 1) I am trying to test the update action. Here is my code:

        it "email is a new one" do
            put :update, id: @user, user: FactoryGirl.attributes_for(:user, :email=>"[email protected]")
            @user.reload
            @user.email.should == "[email protected]"
            puts @user.email
        end

Here is the UsersController update action:

  def update
    @user = User.find(params[:id])
    respond_to do |format|
      if @user.update_attributes(params[:user])
        format.html { redirect_to edit_user_path(@user), :notice => "Your settings were successfully updated."}
        format.json { head :no_content }
      else
        format.html { render action: "edit" }
        format.json { render json: @user.errors, status: :unprocessable_entity }
      end
    end
  end

Here is the error:

 Failure/Error: @user.email.should == "[email protected]"
       expected: "[email protected]"
            got: "[email protected]" (using ==)

It's obvious that the test hasn't changed the email of the user. I took the update action tutorial from here: http://everydayrails.com/2012/04/07/testing-series-rspec-controllers.html . Where I could find the solution?

Answer 1

Could @user.update_attributes(params[:user]) be failing for a validation reason?

Also, you could ensure that your test and the controller method are interacting with the same ruby object. That's been a gotcha for me in the past. The way I do it is to stub the find method on the class.

it "email is a new one" do
  User.stubs(:find).returns(@user)
  put :update, id: @user, user: FactoryGirl.attributes_for(:user, :email=>"[email protected]")
  @user.reload
  @user.email.should == "[email protected]"
  puts @user.email
end

This ensures that you're talking about not only the same record, but the same object during the test.

---

Lastly, I would argue that your test is doing very much for you. You're basically testing update_attributes, which is a core feature and thoroughly tested already. I would focus on testing the controller behavior. Something like this:

let(:user) { FactoryGirl.create(:user) }

describe "PUT #update" do

  before(:each) {
    User.stubs(:find).returns(user)
  }

  it "should redirect to the user path on succesful save" do
    user.should_receive(:update_attributes).and_return true
    put :update, user, {}
    response.should redirect_to(edit_user_path(user))
  end

  it "should render the edit screen again with errors if the model doesn't save" do
    user.should_receive(:update_attributes).and_return false
    put :update, user, {}
    response.should render_template("edit")
  end
end