Question

I have following spec to test controller method:

context "#create" do
  it "should redirect when model is valid" do
    User.stub!(:valid?).and_return(true)
    post :create, :user => FactoryGirl.attributes_for(:user)
    response.should redirect_to("/")
  end
  it "should render new template when model is invalid" do
    User.stub!(:valid?).and_return(false)
    post :create, :user => FactoryGirl.attributes_for(:user)
    response.should render_template(:new)
  end
end

And controller itself:

def create
  @user = User.new(params[:user])
  if @user.save
    redirect_to "/", :notice => "User created"
  else
    render "new"
  end
end

Pretty much straightforward code, but somehow stub! method just doesn’t really stubs, so second spec fails with expecting <"new"> but rendering with <"">. It just redirects like if valid? returned true.

I’m quite new to Rails world. What am I missing? Thanks.

Answer 1

When saving an object, Rails calls valid? on an instance of a class. But you’ve stubbed valid? on the class itself. That won’t work.

What you want to do here is stub save on the instance of User that is being saved, e.g.

User.stub(:new) { mock_model(User, :save => true) }

@user = User.new # @user is now a mock object

@user.save # mock object returns true

For the other example:

User.stub(:new) { mock_model(User, :save => false) }

@user = User.new # again, @user is a mock

@user.save # mock object returns false