How do I make one line tests in Rspec without Shoulda? - ruby-on-rails

I have a bunch of very repetitive rspec tests that all have the same format:
it "inserts the correct ATTRIBUTE_NAME" do
#o.ATTRIBUTE_NAME.should eql(VALUE)
end
It would be nice if I could just make one line tests like:
compare_value(ATTRIBUTE_NAME, VALUE)
But shoulda doesn't seem to be geared toward these types of tests. Are there other alternatives?

Sometimes I regret exposing subject as an end-user device. It was introduced to support extensions (like shoulda matchers), so you can write examples like:
it { should do_something }
Examples like this, however, do not read well:
it { subject.attribute.should do_something }
If you're going to use subject explicitly, and then reference it explicitly in the example, I recommend using specify instead of it:
specify { subject.attribute.should do_something }
The underlying semantics are the same, but this ^^ can be read aloud.

I would write a custom RSpec helper if you want it to read more clearly and be only 1 line. Suppose we have the following class we want to test:
class MyObject
attr_accessor :first, :last, :phone
def initialize first = nil, last = nil, phone = nil
self.first = first
self.last = last
self.phone = phone
end
end
We could write the following matcher:
RSpec::Matchers.define :have_value do |attribute, expected|
match do |obj|
obj.send(attribute) == expected
end
description do
"have value #{expected} for attribute #{attribute}"
end
end
Then to write the tests we could do something like:
describe MyObject do
h = {:first => 'wes', :last => 'bailey', :phone => '111.111.1111'}
subject { MyObject.new h[:first], h[:last], h[:phone] }
h.each do |k,v|
it { should have_value k, v}
end
end
If you put all of this in a file call matcher.rb and run it the following is output:
> rspec -cfn matcher.rb
MyObject
should have value wes for attribute first
should have value bailey for attribute last
should have value 111.111.1111 for attribute phone
Finished in 0.00143 seconds
3 examples, 0 failures

I found this which works great:
specify { #o.attribute.should eql(val) }

subject { #o }
it { attribute.should == value }

Related

How to call local variable value in a method through a parameter?

In my Rails app I have this (rather silly) method:
def my_method(param)
foo = "hey"
bar = "ho"
if param == :foo
return foo
elsif param == :bar
return bar
end
end
I don't like the if/else block, though.
Is there a simpler way to return the value of the local variable foo if :foo is provided as a parameter?
Or will I have to use an array or a hash here?
If you're using the very latest Ruby, you can use binding.local_variable_get(param). A hash seems cleaner to me, but your mileage may vary.
This should look simpler, don't think introducing a new data structure is required:
def my_method(param)
return 'hey' if param == :foo
return 'ho' if param == :bar
end
You can use a Hash:
def my_method(param)
objs = {
foo: "hey",
bar: "ho"
}
objs[param]
end
This is really a good time to use a case statement:
def my_method(param)
case param
when :foo
'hey'
when :bar
'ho'
else
# what do you want to do here?
end
end
Something to consider is, you're using an if/elseif, but what happens if neither of those hit? Do you want to return nil, or trap an error? As you look around in other people's code, you'll sometimes find long chains of if/elseif tests, with no final else, which opens up a potential logic error and can result in a hard-to-find bug.

Rails find with a block

I have seen Rails find method taking a block as
Consumer.find do |c|
c.id == 3
end
Which is similar to Consumer.find(3).
What are some of the use cases where we can actually use block for a find ?
It's a shortcut for .to_a.find { ... }. Here's the method's source code:
def find(*args)
if block_given?
to_a.find(*args) { |*block_args| yield(*block_args) }
else
find_with_ids(*args)
end
end
If you pass a block, it calls .to_a (loading all records) and invokes Enumerable#find on the array.
In other words, it allows you to use Enumerable#find on a ActiveRecord::Relation. This can be useful if your condition can't be expressed or evaluated in SQL, e.g. querying serialized attributes:
Consumer.find { |c| c.preferences[:foo] == :bar }
To avoid confusion, I'd prefer the more explicit version, though:
Consumer.all.to_a.find { |c| c.preferences[:foo] == :bar }
The result may be similar, but the SQL query is not similar to Consumer.find(3)
It is fetching all the consumers and then filtering based on the block. I cant think of a use case where this might be useful
Here is a sample query in the console
consumer = Consumer.find {|c|c.id == 2}
# Consumer Load (0.3ms) SELECT `consumers`.* FROM `consumers`
# => #<Consumer id: 2, name: "xyz", ..>
A good example of a use-case is if you have a JSON/JSONB column and don't want to get involved in the more complex JSON SQL.
required_item = item_collection.find do |item|
item.jsondata['json_array_property'][index]['property'] == clause
end
This is useful if you can constrain the scope of the item_collection to a date-range, for example, and have a smaller set of items that require filtering further.

convert string to model in Rails rake task

I'm trying to run a quick rake task on all my Rails models but haven't been able to call them because this piece of code tells me that I can't call the method columns on a string.
I tried classify instead of camelize and it hasn't worked either, tried inserting a class_eval in there as well, but that dosen't seem to work here / don't know too much about it.
task :collect_models_and_field_names => :environment do
models = Dir.glob("#{models_path}/*").map do |m|
m.capitalize.camelize.columns.each { |n| puts n.name }
end
I do know that this worked so I would have manual access to the model if I needed, but I don't really want to do that...
Model.columns.each { |c| puts c.name }
Try
Kernel.const_get(m.classify).columns
classify just changes the string to look like a class -- i.e. with a capital letter and in camelcase, singular.
after using classify to make the string look like a class/model, you need to use constantize, which actually takes the string and converts it into a class.
See:
http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveSupport/Inflector.html#method-i-constantize
You can use something like this:
models = Dir[Rails.root.join("app", "models", "*.rb")].map do |m|
model = File.basename(m, ".rb").classify.constantize
model.columns.each { |n| puts n.name }
end

Equivalent of .try() for a hash to avoid "undefined method" errors on nil? [duplicate]

This question already has answers here:
How to avoid NoMethodError for nil elements when accessing nested hashes? [duplicate]
(4 answers)
Closed 7 years ago.
In Rails we can do the following in case a value doesn't exist to avoid an error:
#myvar = #comment.try(:body)
What is the equivalent when I'm digging deep into a hash and don't want to get an error?
#myvar = session[:comments][#comment.id]["temp_value"]
# [:comments] may or may not exist here
In the above case, session[:comments]try[#comment.id] doesn't work. What would?
You forgot to put a . before the try:
#myvar = session[:comments].try(:[], #comment.id)
since [] is the name of the method when you do [#comment.id].
The announcement of Ruby 2.3.0-preview1 includes an introduction of Safe navigation operator.
A safe navigation operator, which already exists in C#, Groovy, and
Swift, is introduced to ease nil handling as obj&.foo. Array#dig and
Hash#dig are also added.
This means as of 2.3 below code
account.try(:owner).try(:address)
can be rewritten to
account&.owner&.address
However, one should be careful that & is not a drop in replacement of #try. Take a look at this example:
> params = nil
nil
> params&.country
nil
> params = OpenStruct.new(country: "Australia")
#<OpenStruct country="Australia">
> params&.country
"Australia"
> params&.country&.name
NoMethodError: undefined method `name' for "Australia":String
from (pry):38:in `<main>'
> params.try(:country).try(:name)
nil
It is also including a similar sort of way: Array#dig and Hash#dig. So now this
city = params.fetch(:[], :country).try(:[], :state).try(:[], :city)
can be rewritten to
city = params.dig(:country, :state, :city)
Again, #dig is not replicating #try's behaviour. So be careful with returning values. If params[:country] returns, for example, an Integer, TypeError: Integer does not have #dig method will be raised.
The most beautiful solution is an old answer by Mladen Jablanović, as it lets you to dig in the hash deeper than you could with using direct .try() calls, if you want the code still look nice:
class Hash
def get_deep(*fields)
fields.inject(self) {|acc,e| acc[e] if acc}
end
end
You should be careful with various objects (especially params), because Strings and Arrays also respond to :[], but the returned value may not be what you want, and Array raises exception for Strings or Symbols used as indexes.
That is the reason why in the suggested form of this method (below) the (usually ugly) test for .is_a?(Hash) is used instead of (usually better) .respond_to?(:[]):
class Hash
def get_deep(*fields)
fields.inject(self) {|acc,e| acc[e] if acc.is_a?(Hash)}
end
end
a_hash = {:one => {:two => {:three => "asd"}, :arr => [1,2,3]}}
puts a_hash.get_deep(:one, :two ).inspect # => {:three=>"asd"}
puts a_hash.get_deep(:one, :two, :three ).inspect # => "asd"
puts a_hash.get_deep(:one, :two, :three, :four).inspect # => nil
puts a_hash.get_deep(:one, :arr ).inspect # => [1,2,3]
puts a_hash.get_deep(:one, :arr, :too_deep ).inspect # => nil
The last example would raise an exception: "Symbol as array index (TypeError)" if it was not guarded by this ugly "is_a?(Hash)".
The proper use of try with a hash is #sesion.try(:[], :comments).
#session.try(:[], :comments).try(:[], commend.id).try(:[], 'temp_value')
Update: As of Ruby 2.3 use #dig
Most objects that respond to [] expect an Integer argument, with Hash being an exception that will accept any object (such as strings or symbols).
The following is a slightly more robust version of Arsen7's answer that supports nested Array, Hash, as well as any other objects that expect an Integer passed to [].
It's not fool proof, as someone may have created an object that implements [] and does not accept an Integer argument. However, this solution works great in the common case e.g. pulling nested values from JSON (which has both Hash and Array):
class Hash
def get_deep(*fields)
fields.inject(self) { |acc, e| acc[e] if acc.is_a?(Hash) || (e.is_a?(Integer) && acc.respond_to?(:[])) }
end
end
It can be used the same as Arsen7's solution but also supports arrays e.g.
json = { 'users' => [ { 'name' => { 'first_name' => 'Frank'} }, { 'name' => { 'first_name' => 'Bob' } } ] }
json.get_deep 'users', 1, 'name', 'first_name' # Pulls out 'Bob'
say you want to find params[:user][:email] but it's not sure whether user is there in params or not. Then-
you can try:
params[:user].try(:[], :email)
It will return either nil(if user is not there or email is not there in user) or otherwise the value of email in user.
As of Ruby 2.3 this gets a little easier. Instead of having to nest try statements or define your own method you can now use Hash#dig (documentation).
h = { foo: {bar: {baz: 1}}}
h.dig(:foo, :bar, :baz) #=> 1
h.dig(:foo, :zot) #=> nil
Or in the example above:
session.dig(:comments, #comment.id, "temp_value")
This has the added benefit of being more like try than some of the examples above. If any of the arguments lead to the hash returning nil then it will respond nil.
#myvar = session.fetch(:comments, {}).fetch(#comment.id, {})["temp_value"]
From Ruby 2.0, you can do:
#myvar = session[:comments].to_h[#comment.id].to_h["temp_value"]
From Ruby 2.3, you can do:
#myvar = session.dig(:comments, #comment.id, "temp_value")
Another approach:
#myvar = session[:comments][#comment.id]["temp_value"] rescue nil
This might also be consider a bit dangerous because it can hide too much, personally I like it.
If you want more control, you may consider something like:
def handle # just an example name, use what speaks to you
raise $! unless $!.kind_of? NoMethodError # Do whatever checks or
# reporting you want
end
# then you may use
#myvar = session[:comments][#comment.id]["temp_value"] rescue handle
When you do this:
myhash[:one][:two][:three]
You're just chaining a bunch of calls to a "[]" method, an the error occurs if myhash[:one] returns nil, because nil doesn't have a [] method. So, one simple and rather hacky way is to add a [] method to Niclass, which returns nil: i would set this up in a rails app as follows:
Add the method:
#in lib/ruby_extensions.rb
class NilClass
def [](*args)
nil
end
end
Require the file:
#in config/initializers/app_environment.rb
require 'ruby_extensions'
Now you can call nested hashes without fear: i'm demonstrating in the console here:
>> hash = {:foo => "bar"}
=> {:foo=>"bar"}
>> hash[:foo]
=> "bar"
>> hash[:doo]
=> nil
>> hash[:doo][:too]
=> nil
Andrew's answer didn't work for me when I tried this again recently. Maybe something has changed?
#myvar = session[:comments].try('[]', #comment.id)
The '[]' is in quotes instead of a symbol :[]
Try to use
#myvar = session[:comments][#comment.id]["temp_value"] if session[:comments]

Rails / ActiveRecord: field normalization

I'm trying to remove the commas from a field in a model. I want the user to type a number, i.e. 10,000 and that number should be stored in the database as 10000. I was hoping that I could do some model-side normalization to remove the comma. I don't want to depend on the view or controller to properly format my data.
I tried:
before_validation :normalize
def normalize
self['thenumber'] = self['thenumber'].to_s.gsub(',','')
end
no worky.
http://github.com/mdeering/attribute_normalizer looks like a promising solution to this common problem. Here are a few examples from the home page:
# By default it will strip leading and trailing whitespace
# and set to nil if blank.
normalize_attributes :author, :publisher
# Using one of our predefined normalizers.
normalize_attribute :price, :with => :currency
# You can also define your normalization block inline.
normalize_attribute :title do |value|
value.is_a?(String) ? value.titleize.strip : value
end
So in your case you might do something like this:
normalize_attribute :title do |value|
value.to_s.gsub(',', '')
end
I think you're doing it right. This test passes:
test "should remove commas from thenumber" do
f = Foo.new(:thenumber => "10,000")
f.save
f = Foo.find(f.id)
assert f.thenumber == "10000"
end
And I used your code.
class Foo < ActiveRecord::Base
before_validation :normalize
def normalize
self['thenumber'] = self['thenumber'].to_s.gsub(',','')
end
end
Now, my schema is set up for thenumber to be a string though, not an integer.
Started
.
Finished in 0.049666 seconds.
1 tests, 1 assertions, 0 failures, 0 errors
If you wanted to store this in the db as an integer, then you definitely need to override the setter:
def thenumber=(value)
self['thenumber'] = value.to_s.gsub(',','').to_i
end
If you do it your way, with an integer column, it gets truncated by AR....
>> f.thenumber = "10,000"
=> "10,000"
>> f.thenumber
=> 10
That's a little-known thing with Ruby and integers... it auto-casts by truncating anything that's no longer an integer.
irb(main):004:0> i = "155-brian-hogan".to_i
=> 155
Can be cool for things like
/users/155-brian-hogan
#user = User.find_by_id(params[:id])
But not so cool for what you're doing.
So either change the col to a string and use the filter, or change the setter :)
Good luck!
The problem with doing it that way is that for a while, the non-normalized stuff will exist in the object; if you have code that works on the attributes before stuff gets normalised, then that will be a problem.
You could define a setter:
def thenumber=(value)
# normalise stuff here, call write_attribute
end
Unfortunately I think a lot of the Rails form stuff writes the attributes directly, which is one of the reasons I don't tend to use it.
Or you could normalise the params in the controller before you pass them through.
Does ruby let you interchange between a . and [''] ?
I don't know, I'll try later, but I think you are supposed to use .
self.thenumber = self.thenumber.to_s.gsub(',','')
You should return true from your before_validation method, otherwise if the expression being assigned to self['thenumber'] ends up being nil or false, the data will not be saved, per the Rails documention:
If a before_* callback returns false,
all the later callbacks and the
associated action are cancelled.
Ostensibly, you are trying to normalize here then check the result of the normalization with your Rails validations, which will decide if nil/false/blank are okay or not.
before_validation :normalize
def normalize
self['thenumber'] = self['thenumber'].to_s.gsub(',','')
return true
end

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