Rails FactoryBot/Rspec not creating using let - ruby-on-rails

Question

So this is my first time writing unit tests, and Im incorporating Rspec w/FactoryBot.
My Specs were working just fine with using # instance variables, However when I use let! the second model fails because the first model was never created.
Spec:
require "rails_helper"
RSpec.describe Note, :type => :model do
before(:all) do
let!(:event){ FactoryBot.create(:event) }
let!(:note){ FactoryBot.create(:note) }
end
it "is valid with valid attributes" do
expect(note).to be_valid
end
end
Factories:
FactoryBot.define do
factory :note do
event_id Event.first.id
content "This is a sample note"
end
end
FactoryBot.define do
factory :event do
title "Event Factory Test"
event_date Date.today
event_time "1:30 PM"
end
end
As you can see, the note requires a Event id (Which requires the event to be created), but it complains when trying to find Event.first.id which should have been created from the let!).
Any ideas? This "seems" to be similar to how others use let in other rspec tests.

Answer 1

let and let! do not work if you wrap them in a before block.
require "rails_helper"
RSpec.describe Note, :type => :model do
let!(:event){ FactoryBot.create(:event) }
let!(:note){ FactoryBot.create(:note) }
it "is valid with valid attributes" do
expect(note).to be_valid
end
end
Also to setup an association within a factory simply pass the name of the factory:
FactoryBot.define do
factory :note do
event # short for association :event
content "This is a sample note"
end
end
(If the factory name is the same as the association name, the factory name can be left out.).
You're still thinking about factories wrong though. They should be factories that produce unique testable records. Not a set of fixtures. The way you have defined it the factory would only work if a event has been created. Never hardwire factories!
If you want to get the event later just do:
require "rails_helper"
RSpec.describe Note, :type => :model do
let!(:note){ FactoryBot.create(:note) }
it "has an event" do
expect(note.event).to be_a Event
end
end