Rails - Oct 2005 - validate messages and testing

Hi All,

I''m trying to get my rails tests to show validation failure messages,
but I''m not having much luck.

I''ve got a test like:

def test_create
u = User.new
u.username = "nonexistingbob"
begin
assert u.save!
rescue ActiveRecord::RecordInvalid => error
print "\n"+$!.message
print "\n"+ error.inspect
raise
end
end

and I get a RecordInvalid thrown based on things like the following in
the user class:

validates_presence_of :firstname, :lastname, :email, :username, :on =>
:create, :message => "fullname/email required"

but I can''t seem to access the :message from the test code - whatever I
try and print I never get any more information than just
ActiveRecord::RecordInvalid

Is there a way to display the message associated with validation
failure, or is that only an option from within a controller?

Many thanks in advance.

CHEERS> SAM

Hello Sam,

2005/10/13, Sam Joseph <sam@neurogrid.com>:
> Is there a way to display the message associated with validation
> failure, or is that only an option from within a controller?
You need the errors property of the model:

u.errors.full_messages.inspect

See http://api.rubyonrails.com/classes/ActiveRecord/Validations.html#M000629

Bye,
François

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Francois Beausoleil wrote:
> Hello Sam,
> 
> 2005/10/13, Sam Joseph <sam-wUweuJJ0J032eFz/2MeuCQ@public.gmane.org>:
> 
>>Is there a way to display the message associated with validation
>>failure, or is that only an option from within a controller?
> 
> 
> You need the errors property of the model:
> 
> u.errors.full_messages.inspect
> 
> See
http://api.rubyonrails.com/classes/ActiveRecord/Validations.html#M000629
A while back (August 21 2005), in the thread "Reverse validation in 
testing, no validation at all in development" Nicholas Seckar gave 
advice on testing validation. Google can''t find this in on-line
archives
(and it''s not in the ASPN archive, even though other messages in the 
same thread are there), so I''m reproducing the whole text below.

regards,

    Justin

Nicholas Seckar (aka Ulysses) wrote:

Your validations ought to be tested in your unit tests (test/unit) 
rather than functional tests.

Well, your functional tests should try to create and save invalid 
objects too, but thinks work better if you first use your unit tests to 
ensure that your validations work properly. Generally you''ll get better
errors, and it is an easier environment to debug models from.

If you find validation tests frustratingly verbose, check out my AR test 
helper:

http://www.bigbold.com/snippets/posts/show/573

Using it, meanial tests such as

# Test to make sure the association tables are set up,
# and that the associated models can be loaded
def test_associations_work
   assert project.users && project.users.find_all
   assert project.owner
end

def test_validations_for_name
   project.name = ''BigProject''
   assert ! project.valid?
   assert_matches /already taken/, project.errors.on(:name)

   [nil, ''''].each dp |name|
     project.name = name
     assert ! project.valid?
     assert_matches /can''t be blank/, project.errors.on(:name)
   end

   project.name = ''new name''
   assert project.valid?
   assert project.save # make sure the database agrees with us
end

Can be written as

check_associations %w(users owner)

check_validations_for :name do
   invalid ''BigProject'', /already taken/
   [nil, ''''].each {|name| invalid name, /can''t be
blank/}
   valid ''new name''
end

Dry, eh? ;-) "