rspec users - Jan 2010 - Loading numerous data structures from YAML files

All,

I am writing specs for some multi-stage tests which require a lot of 
input data.

A simplified overview of the tests is as follows:

  * Provide list of network interfaces, confirm they are added to the 
database
  * Provide list of network interfaces as above, but with one entry 
added, and confirm this entry is added to the database
  * Provide list of network interfaces as above, but with a different 
entry removed, and confirm this entry is added to the database

I want to isolate the test data from the specs themselves for 
cleanliness, and I am thinking of putting them in YAML files.

How best should I tackle this?  Where should I put the YAML files and is 
there any functionality in RSpec that will help?  Should I roll my own 
"load test data" code and present that to the test code?

Best wishes,


Peter

On Jan 2, 5:17?am, Peter Hicks <peter.hi... at poggs.co.uk>
wrote:
>
> How best should I tackle this? ?Where should I put the YAML files and is
> there any functionality in RSpec that will help? ?Should I roll my own
> "load test data" code and present that to the test code?
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Peter
Hi Peter,

Have you read about fixtures? It sounds like just what you''re looking
for.

Peace,
Phillip

Hi Phillip

Phillip Koebbe wrote:
> Have you read about fixtures? It sounds like just what you''re
looking
> for.
I''m using fixtures already - they''re great.  I can''t
find a way to load
a specific fixture in to a table.  If I could do that, I could load a 
set of data, run the code, check the results, and repeat again for the 
next test.


Peter

Peter Hicks <peter.hicks at poggs.co.uk> on 2010-01-02 at
16:13:
> Hi Phillip
>
> Phillip Koebbe wrote:
>
>> Have you read about fixtures? It sounds like just what you''re
looking
>> for.
>
> I''m using fixtures already - they''re great.  I
can''t find a way to load a
> specific fixture in to a table.  If I could do that, I could load a set of 
> data, run the code, check the results, and repeat again for the next test.
My group has mostly moved off fixtures towards factory_girl, but we
still depend on a couple of tables'' worth of data to get a basic
environment set up for some of our cucumber features.

For this I use the little-documented method that is used internally by
ActiveRecord::Fixtures called ''create_fixtures''.
> create_fixtures(fixtures_directory, table_names, class_names = {})
http://apidock.com/rails/Fixtures/create_fixtures/class

Since it accepts a directory first, you can store the YAML files
wherever you''d like, and load them when you choose -- in
spec/spec_helper.rb or in individual example groups if you wanted.

Here''s a snippet from my features/support/env.rb to give you an idea:

  Fixtures.create_fixtures(''test/fixtures'',
''roles'')
  Fixtures.create_fixtures(''test/fixtures'',
''role_members'')
  Fixtures.create_fixtures(''test/fixtures'',
''rights'')

Hope this helps!

Paul