Question

In the test below, the Bar and Baz blocks contain identical specs.

Leaving aside why such repetition was necessary in the first place, I’m wondering how one could dry this up.

I tried turning the blocks into objects and calling them under Bar and Baz, but possibly because I did not get the scopes right, I have not been able to make it work.

describe Foo do
  describe Bar do
    before(:each) do
      prepare
    end

    it "should do something" do
      true
    end

    it "should do something else" do
      true
    end
  end

  describe Baz do
    before(:each) do
      prepare_something_else
    end

    it "should do something" do
      true
    end

    it "should do something else" do
      true
    end
  end
end

Answer 1

you might want to create macros. here are some tutorials:

http://www.benmabey.com/2008/06/08/writing-macros-in-rspec/
http://intridea.com/2009/5/15/make-it-so-with-rspec-macros?blog=company
http://railscasts.com/episodes/157-rspec-matchers-macros