rspec users - Jan 2011 - rspec-rails 2 adding current account helper to all view specs

Hi,

in rspec-1 view specs i had the ability to say:

   login_as(some_role_or_account)

which made some helper methods like

   current_account

that where used in views and controllers return something valuable.

Implementation was based on the fact that the controller in rspec-1
was ApplicationController. My ApplicationController contained a method
for setting the current_account.

In Rspec2 this is broken as the controller in ViewExampleGroup is now
ActionView::TestCase::TestController.

Would anyone know of an elegant way to add functionality, like helper
methods, to this controller instance in all ViewExampleGroups only.

option 1, which i don''t like because it depends on the fact that
ViewExampleGroup uses ActionView::TestCase::TestController:

   class ActionView::TestCase::TestController
       attr_accessor :current_account
       helper_method :current_account
   end
   module RSpec::Rails::ViewExampleGroup
       def login_as account
           controller.current_account = account
       end
   end

I would like to use some hook to add these methods only to the
controller instance used in the view specs, regardless of what class
it is.

There must be an elegant way, is there?

Cheers
Rob

Hi Rob,

On 27 Jan 2011, at 21:45, Rob Westgeest wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> in rspec-1 view specs i had the ability to say:
> 
>   login_as(some_role_or_account)
> 
> which made some helper methods like
> 
>   current_account
> 
> that where used in views and controllers return something valuable.
> 
> Implementation was based on the fact that the controller in rspec-1
> was ApplicationController. My ApplicationController contained a method
> for setting the current_account.
> 
> In Rspec2 this is broken as the controller in ViewExampleGroup is now
> ActionView::TestCase::TestController.
> 
> Would anyone know of an elegant way to add functionality, like helper
> methods, to this controller instance in all ViewExampleGroups only.
> 
> option 1, which i don''t like because it depends on the fact that
> ViewExampleGroup uses ActionView::TestCase::TestController:
> 
>   class ActionView::TestCase::TestController
>       attr_accessor :current_account
>       helper_method :current_account
>   end
>   module RSpec::Rails::ViewExampleGroup
>       def login_as account
>           controller.current_account = account
>       end
>   end
> 
> I would like to use some hook to add these methods only to the
> controller instance used in the view specs, regardless of what class
> it is.
> 
> There must be an elegant way, is there?
In your spec_helper, you can use the configuration block to tell RSpec to extend
(i.e. mix a module in) to each ExampleGroup:

RSpec.configure do |config|
  config.extend(MySpecialLoginMethods)
end

So you can define your test helper methods like #login_as in a module called
MySpecialLoginMethods and then have it mixed in to each example group.

You can also filter this, so it only does it to certain types of ExampleGroup. I
can''t remember exactly what the syntax is for filtering on view specs,
but something like this:

RSpec.configure do |config|
  config.extend(MySpecialLoginMethods, :view)
end

Does that help?

cheers,
Matt

matt at mattwynne.net
07974 430184