Set Rspec default GET request format to JSON - ruby-on-rails

Question

I am doing functional tests for my controllers with Rspec. I have set my default response format in my router to JSON, so every request without a suffix will return JSON.
Now in rspec, i get an error (406) when i try
get :index
I need to do
get :index, :format => :json
Now because i am primarily supporting JSON with my API, it is very redundant having to specify the JSON format for every request.
Can i somehow set it to default for all my GET requests? (or all requests)

Answer 1

before :each do
request.env["HTTP_ACCEPT"] = 'application/json'
end

Answer 2

Put this in spec/support:
require 'active_support/concern'
module DefaultParams
extend ActiveSupport::Concern
def process_with_default_params(action, parameters, session, flash, method)
process_without_default_params(action, default_params.merge(parameters || {}), session, flash, method)
end
included do
let(:default_params) { {} }
alias_method_chain :process, :default_params
end
end
RSpec.configure do |config|
config.include(DefaultParams, :type => :controller)
end
And then simply override default_params:
describe FooController do
let(:default_params) { {format: :json} }
...
end

Answer 3

The following works for me with rspec 3:
before :each do
request.headers["accept"] = 'application/json'
end
This sets HTTP_ACCEPT.

Answer 4

Here is a solution that
works for request specs,
works with Rails 5, and
does not involve private API of Rails (like process).
Here's the RSpec configuration:
module DefaultFormat
extend ActiveSupport::Concern
included do
let(:default_format) { 'application/json' }
prepend RequestHelpersCustomized
end
module RequestHelpersCustomized
l = lambda do |path, **kwarg|
kwarg[:headers] = {accept: default_format}.merge(kwarg[:headers] || {})
super(path, **kwarg)
end
%w(get post patch put delete).each do |method|
define_method(method, l)
end
end
end
RSpec.configure do |config|
config.include DefaultFormat, type: :request
end
Verified with
describe 'the response format', type: :request do
it 'can be overridden in request' do
get some_path, headers: {accept: 'text/plain'}
expect(response.content_type).to eq('text/plain')
end
context 'with default format set as HTML' do
let(:default_format) { 'text/html' }
it 'is HTML in the context' do
get some_path
expect(response.content_type).to eq('text/html')
end
end
end
FWIW, The RSpec configuration can be placed:
Directly in spec/spec_helper.rb. This is not suggested; the file will be loaded even when testing library methods in lib/.
Directly in spec/rails_helper.rb.
(my favorite) In spec/support/default_format.rb, and be loaded explicitly in spec/rails_helper.rb with
require 'support/default_format'
In spec/support, and be loaded by
Dir[Rails.root.join('spec/support/**/*.rb')].each { |f| require f }
which loads all the files in spec/support.
This solution is inspired by knoopx's answer. His solution doesn't work for request specs, and alias_method_chain has been deprecated in favor of Module#prepend.

Answer 5

In RSpec 3, you need make JSON tests be request specs in order to have the views render. Here is what I use:
# spec/requests/companies_spec.rb
require 'rails_helper'
RSpec.describe "Companies", :type => :request do
let(:valid_session) { {} }
describe "JSON" do
it "serves multiple companies as JSON" do
FactoryGirl.create_list(:company, 3)
get 'companies', { :format => :json }, valid_session
expect(response.status).to be(200)
expect(JSON.parse(response.body).length).to eq(3)
end
it "serves JSON with correct name field" do
company = FactoryGirl.create(:company, name: "Jane Doe")
get 'companies/' + company.to_param, { :format => :json }, valid_session
expect(response.status).to be(200)
expect(JSON.parse(response.body)['name']).to eq("Jane Doe")
end
end
end
As for setting the format on all tests, I like the approach from this other answer: https://stackoverflow.com/a/14623960/1935918

Answer 6

Perhaps you could add the first answer into spec/spec_helper or spec/rails_helper with this:
config.before(:each) do
request.env["HTTP_ACCEPT"] = 'application/json' if defined? request
end
if in model test (or any not exist request methods context), this code just ignore.
it worked with rspec 3.1.7 and rails 4.1.0
it should be worked with all rails 4 version generally speaking.

Answer 7

Running Rails 5 and Rspec 3.5 I had to set the headers to accomplish this.
post '/users', {'body' => 'params'}, {'ACCEPT' => 'application/json'}
Thi matches what the example in the docs looks like:
require "rails_helper"
RSpec.describe "Widget management", :type => :request do
it "creates a Widget" do
headers = {
"ACCEPT" => "application/json", # This is what Rails 4 accepts
"HTTP_ACCEPT" => "application/json" # This is what Rails 3 accepts
}
post "/widgets", { :widget => {:name => "My Widget"} }, headers
expect(response.content_type).to eq("application/json")
expect(response).to have_http_status(:created)
end
end

Answer 8

Per the Rspec docs, the supported method is through the headers:
require "rails_helper"
RSpec.describe "Widget management", :type => :request do
it "creates a Widget" do
headers = {
"ACCEPT" => "application/json", # This is what Rails 4 and 5 accepts
"HTTP_ACCEPT" => "application/json", # This is what Rails 3 accepts
}
post "/widgets", :params => { :widget => {:name => "My Widget"} }, :headers => headers
expect(response.content_type).to eq("application/json")
expect(response).to have_http_status(:created)
end
end

Answer 9

For those folks who work with request tests the easiest way I found is to override #process method in ActionDispatch::Integration::Session and set default as parameter to :json like this:
module DefaultAsForProcess
def process(method, path, params: nil, headers: nil, env: nil, xhr: false, as: :json)
super
end
end
ActionDispatch::Integration::Session.prepend(DefaultAsForProcess)

Answer 10

Not sure if this will work for this specific case. But what I needed in particular was to be able to pass a params hash to the post method. Most solutions seem to be for rspec 3 and up, and mention adding a 3rd parameter like so:
post '/post_path', params: params_hash, :format => 'json'
(or similar, the :format => 'json' bit varies)
But none of those worked. The controller would receive a hash like: {params: => { ... }}, with the unwanted params: key.
What did work (with rails 3 and rspec 2) was:
post '/post_path', params_hash.merge({:format => 'json'})
Also check this related post, where I got the solution from: Using Rspec, how do I test the JSON format of my controller in Rails 3.0.11?

Answer 11

Why don't RSpec's methods, "get", "post", "put", "delete" work in a controller spec in a gem (or outside Rails)?
Based off this question, you could try redefining process() in ActionController::TestCase from https://github.com/rails/rails/blob/32395899d7c97f69b508b7d7f9b7711f28586679/actionpack/lib/action_controller/test_case.rb.
Here is my workaround though.
describe FooController do
let(:defaults) { {format: :json} }
context 'GET index' do
let(:params) { defaults }
before :each do
get :index, params
end
# ...
end
context 'POST create' do
let(:params) { defaults.merge({ name: 'bar' }) }
before :each do
post :create, params
end
# ...
end
end