Laravel 10 Unit Test does not see DB change from Artisan Command

Question

I have an artisan command (Laravel 10) that makes a change to the user table in the database. I can confirm that the change is happening with output from the command itself, and it looks like it's actually working.

However, when I run the unit test, it does not see the updated database change.

Unit Test

public function test_promote_user_command_sets_user_as_super_admin()
{
    $user = $this->createUser('guest');

    $response = $this->artisan("user:promote {$user->email}")->assertSuccessful();

    $role = Role::where('name', '=', 'Super Admin')->first();
    $this->assertDatabaseHas('users', [
        'id' => $user->id,
        'role_id' => $role->id
    ]);
}

Artisan Command

class PromoteUserCommand extends Command
{
    /**
     * The name and signature of the console command.
     *
     * @var string
     */
    protected $signature = 'user:promote {email}';

    /**
     * The console command description.
     *
     * @var string
     */
    protected $description = 'Promote a user to super admin.';

    /**
     * Execute the console command.
     */
    public function handle(): void
    {
        $role = Role::where('name', '=', 'Super Admin')->first();        
        $user = User::where('email', '=', $this->argument('email'))->first();

        $user->role_id = $role->id;
        $user->save();
    }
}

When I run the test I get this output:

  Failed asserting that a row in the table [users] matches the attributes {
    "id": 1,
    "role_id": 1
}.

Found similar results: [
    {
        "id": 1,
        "role_id": null
    }
].

However, if in the artisan command I run dd($user) after the $user->save() and then I run the test, I get this:

...
  #attributes: array:9 [
    "id" => 1
    "name" => "Karelle Schamberger"
    "email" => "[email protected]"
    "email_verified_at" => "2023-03-04 18:22:36"
    "password" => "$2y$10$92IXUNpkjO0rOQ5byMi.Ye4oKoEa3Ro9llC/.og/at2.uheWG/igi"
    "remember_token" => "Br992xsWw9"
    "created_at" => "2023-03-04 18:22:36"
    "updated_at" => "2023-03-04 18:22:36"
    "role_id" => 1
  ]
  #original: array:9 [
    "id" => 1
    "name" => "Karelle Schamberger"
    "email" => "[email protected]"
    "email_verified_at" => "2023-03-04 18:22:36"
    "password" => "$2y$10$92IXUNpkjO0rOQ5byMi.Ye4oKoEa3Ro9llC/.og/at2.uheWG/igi"
    "remember_token" => "Br992xsWw9"
    "created_at" => "2023-03-04 18:22:36"
    "updated_at" => "2023-03-04 18:22:36"
    "role_id" => 1
  ]
  #changes: array:1 [
    "role_id" => 1
  ]
...

So I know that the command is being run and that it is working properly. Why does it seem that this change is reverted before the test assertion happens?

Edited to add:

I also changed the command to do a DB lookup on the table after the $user->save() and the DB result also shows the change is in the database...

So the DB changes is taking place within the artisan command, but either that change is reverted or some how the unit test is not seeing the latest DB status.

All of my other 94+ tests that do not involve the artisan command work just fine with database testing. It is only the artisan command that is having this issue.

matiaslauriti · Accepted Answer · 2023-03-04 20:11:04Z

8

First of all, you do not use user:promote whatever_value, you use artisan("user:promote", ['email' => $user->email]).

Second, the issue is that artisan method, returns a class that you then call ->assertSuccessful();, this last method returns nothing, BUT it is using __destruct, that means that, when nothing else is calling the class, it will execute the command and return the class, and then call assertXXXXX.

But because you are storing that in a variable, nothing is executed until the variable goes out of scope, when the test finishes, so the command is not run...

This is the __destruct code, so you can see it is literally executing run(), hence executing your command.

See that $this->artisan(...) returns a PendingCommand, the one I shared before (__destruct).

More PHP official info about it here. The important part to take away from it is:

The destructor method will be called as soon as there are no other references to a particular object, or in any order during the shutdown sequence.

Your code:

public function test_promote_user_command_sets_user_as_super_admin()
{
    $user = $this->createUser('guest');

    $response = $this->artisan("user:promote {$user->email}")->assertSuccessful();

    $role = Role::where('name', '=', 'Super Admin')->first();
    $this->assertDatabaseHas('users', [
        'id' => $user->id,
        'role_id' => $role->id
    ]);

    // Now the artisan command is executed
}

Correct code:

public function test_promote_user_command_sets_user_as_super_admin()
{
    $user = $this->createUser('guest');

    $this->artisan("user:promote {$user->email}")->assertSuccessful();

    // Now the artisan command is executed

    $role = Role::where('name', '=', 'Super Admin')->first();
    $this->assertDatabaseHas('users', [
        'id' => $user->id,
        'role_id' => $role->id
    ]);
}

edited Mar 4, 2023 at 20:11

answered Mar 4, 2023 at 20:04

matiaslauriti

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4 Comments

JLZenor Over a year ago

This is interesting... On another test I have:

$response = $this->artisan("user:promote {$user->email}"); $response->expectsOutput("User {$user->name} was promoted to Super Admin");

and that test passes just fine. So something is being executed, but not DB changes? Thanks for all the info. I'll keep this in mind in future tests of artisan commands.

matiaslauriti Over a year ago

@JLZenor That is working because you are calling $response->expectsOutput(..), but $response is a PendingCommand object, see the update I have added. So when you call expectsOutput and then nothing else, the __destruct is called, hence running the command, but expectsOutput just sets expectations, nothing is run, see what it is doing: github.com/laravel/framework/blob/…, it is literally setting a value, so when the command is run, then asserts (checks arrays for different assertions)

matiaslauriti Over a year ago

No worries, just have this in mind: do not use variables on things that return nothing back, specially in tests. There are some objects that works with this "pattern", so if you use a variable on a method that returns nothing or just the object itself (but you are not required to call an execute method) just don't declare a variable 👌

F3CP Over a year ago

If you need to assign the command to a variable (e.g. so you can chain additional methods within a loop), you can call ->execute() to trigger the command to run directly rather than waiting for __destruct() to be called. Alternatively you can use unset() or assign the variable to null in order to force __destruct() to be called.

mrhn · Accepted Answer · 2023-03-04 18:54:13Z

1

Can't pinpoint exactly where your problem is, but there is some things that are not as intended.

You are calling the command with the value surrounded by brackets, which i think should not be there, as you would not include them in the cli. Secondly the second parameter or artisan() can be the data values. Changing this into.

$this->artisan("user:promote", ['email' => $user->email]);

Secondly you are actually not knowing if the command has crashed. Even if it seems simply a lot of small things can cause it to crash and your test would just continue, so also asserting the outcome of the command will guarantee it is executed correctly.

$this->artisan("user:promote", ['email' => $user->email])
    ->assertSuccessful();

answered Mar 4, 2023 at 18:54

mrhn

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3 Comments

JLZenor Over a year ago

I updated the test to include assertSuccessful(). That assertion is passing, but still the database does not update. The way that I'm sending the email in is a valid string interpolation format. I know that is making it into the command correctly because of how it executes (it finds the user via that email).

mrhn Over a year ago

do you app use multiple connections to databases?

JLZenor Over a year ago

Just one database. For testing it is using an in-memory sqlite db.

JLZenor · Accepted Answer · 2023-03-04 20:01:49Z

0

I found the problem, but I do not know why this is a problem.

I had to change this line:

$response = $this->artisan("user:promote {$user->email}")->assertSuccessful();

To this:

$this->artisan("user:promote {$user->email}")->assertSuccessful();

For some reason, trying to capture the output into a response variable made this act strange. To troubleshoot I used the enableQueryLog.

\DB::enableQueryLog();
$response = $this->artisan("user:promote {$user->email}")->assertSuccessful();
dd(\DB::getQueryLog());

This showed nothing being changed (even though if I did a dd within the command it still worked...), and when I removed the $response = then the query returned the expected results.

edited Mar 4, 2023 at 20:01

answered Mar 4, 2023 at 19:57

JLZenor

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2 Comments

mrhn Over a year ago

This would indicate something else is wrong, saving it to a variable would have no impact on the execution as it happens after.

matiaslauriti Over a year ago

@mrhn see my answer, it does have an impact!

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