Why must I reload instance variables in rspec specs?

Question

I have a spec like the following:

describe 'toggle_approval' do
  before(:each) do
    @comment = Comment.make(id: 55, approved: false)
  end

  it "toggles the visibility of the discussion" do
    post :toggle_approval, id: 55
    #@comment.reload
    @comment.approved.should be_true
  end
end

This spec will fail unless I uncomment the line that reloads the comment. Why is rails not reloading this for me?

It's simple. Do not use instance variable. Use let instead. — Hauleth
– Hauleth, Commented Mar 3, 2014 at 9:22

Marek Lipka · Accepted Answer · 2014-03-03 09:16:33Z

5

Because you don't tell it to reload your record. Comment instance in your controller is created independently from @comment variable set in your specs. So if you don't use reload explicitly, it won't be reloaded. If you want your Comment instance in controller to be the same instance than in spec, you can do some stubbing:

Comment.should_receive(:find).with(@comment.id) { @comment }

answered Mar 3, 2014 at 9:16

Marek Lipka

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dimitry_n · Accepted Answer · 2017-03-01 05:52:21Z

1

To add to Marek's answer, you can also call .reload inline like so:

it "toggles the visibility of the discussion" do
  post :toggle_approval, id: 55
  @comment.reload.approved.should be_true
end

or use something like this:

it "toggles the visibility of the discussion" do
  expect {
    post :toggle_approval, id: 55
  }.to change {
    @comment.reload.approved
  }.from(...)
   .to(...)
end

answered Mar 1, 2017 at 5:52

dimitry_n

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