# Assert Method is Used? (ActiveRecord Scopes)

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/assert-method-is-used-activerecord-scopes/261854>\
**Category:** RSpec\
**Created:** [September 21, 2021, 9:19am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/assert-method-is-used-activerecord-scopes/261854 "2021-09-21T09:19:51Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![mball](https://www.ruby-forum.com/user_avatar/www.ruby-forum.com/mball/32/2839_2.png) [@mball](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/mball)\
**Post date:** [September 21, 2021, 9:19am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/assert-method-is-used-activerecord-scopes/261854/1 "2021-09-21T09:19:52Z")

</div>

Long time lurker… I fully admit: This is kind of an exceptional use case for rspec. I’m teaching a course which uses Rails, and as such I’ve got some tricky things I’d like to test for.

How can I `expect` that a method calls `where`, or calls it indirectly through something like a scope or method chaining?

Here’s what I’ve got:

```auto
# activerecord_praice_spec.rb

before(:each) do
        expect(Customer).to receive(:where).and_call_original
end

#...
specify 'with valid email (email addr contains "@") (HINT: look up SQL LIKE operator)' do
  check Customer.with_valid_email, [1,2,4,5,7,8,10,11,12,13,14,15,17,18,19,20,23,26,29,30]
end

```

(`check` simply does some formatting to clarify which records should/shouldn’t be in the result).

```auto
# activerecord_practice.rb

class Customer < ActiveRecord:Base
  def self.with_valid_email
      where( ....)
   end

```

If the method body always starts with `where`, then the expectation works fine. This all makes sense to me.

However, I would like to support (and even encourage) students to write scopes, such that this might be a valid function:

```auto
  def self.with_valid_email_and_born_before_1980
    born_before('1980-01-01').and(valid_email)
  end

```

`born_before` and `valid_email` are defined as scopes. Inside the scope, `where` is still used. So ideally what I am looking for is "somewhere in this callstack `where` is called. To make matters a little complex, the names of the scopes would be up to students.

Like I said, this one’s stumped me a bit because I’ve never had a use quite like this in a production codebase (thankfully!).

Appreciate any ideas!