Question

Say I have 2 tests:

describe "Data Processor" do
  it "should parse simple sample data correctly" do
   ... 
  end 

  it "should parse complex sample data correctly" do
   ... 
  end 
end 

Is there a way using Rspec to make the second test dependent on the first one? The reason I ask is because I’m using Watchr and the second test takes quite a bit more time. If the first test fails, the second one will very likely fail as well. They aren’t really dependent on each other but it’s kind of a waste of time to run the second test if the first one fails.

I can skip the test with Ctrl C in Watchr but I’m wondering if there’s a better way. Didn’t find anything via google.

Answer 1

Sometimes I add this line to my .rspec:

--fail-fast

which is a command-line flag telling rspec to exit after the first failure. It may not be exactly what you want; it doesn’t tie two particular examples together but rather quits your entire test suite when anything fails.

But when I’m hammering out a new bit of code with autotest/guard/watchr, I like to turn this on since I only want to work on one failure at a time, anyway. Much faster.