# Reinstantiate controller during functional testing **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [October 14, 2009, 7:21pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/reinstantiate-controller-during-functional-testing/177310 "2009-10-14T19:21:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/c0e974/32.png) [@oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/oldbug)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2009, 7:21pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/reinstantiate-controller-during-functional-testing/177310/1 "2009-10-14T19:21:31Z")
… ok, I may be going about this the wrong way, or perhaps, a less efficient way than is optimal, but I would like to test a little bit of AJAX on one of my web pages. When I test this by hand, I bring up the page which shows a select box, I select an item from the drop down list, see another select box show up, go back to the first select box, select a different item, and see something different happen. I have tried to script this up in my functional test with something like this: test “blah blah blah” xhr :post, :add\_lot\_to\_assembly, :id =\> lots(:lot\_one).to\_param, :use\_part =\> parts(:part\_three).to\_param assert\_response :success ``` xhr :post, :add_lot_to_assembly, :id => lots(:lot_one).to_param, :use_part => parts(:part_two).to_param assert_response :success ``` end The problem is, there is an instance variable in my controller that is set during the handling of the first #add\_lot\_to\_assembly action. It remains set for the second invocation of #xhr. This makes me think that the controller instance is not reinstantiated between calls to #xhr. Am I misunderstanding this? Is there some way to reinstantiate the controller prior to the 2nd xhr call? Is there a better way to have structured my functional test? Should I be using something other than a functional test to test this sort of behavior? –wpd ---
**Author:** ![oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/c0e974/32.png) [@oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/oldbug)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2009, 6:29pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/reinstantiate-controller-during-functional-testing/177310/2 "2009-10-15T18:29:28Z")
On Oct 14, 1:19 pm, Patrick D. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > The problem is, there is an instance variable in my controller that is > set during the handling of the first #add\_lot\_to\_assembly action. It > remains set for the second invocation of #xhr. This makes me think > that the controller instance is not reinstantiated between calls to > #xhr. > > Am I misunderstanding this? It sounds like you’ve got a clear idea what’s going on. > Is there some way to reinstantiate the controller prior to the 2nd xhr call? > > Is there a better way to have structured my functional test? > > Should I be using something other than a functional test to test this > sort of behavior? The standard way of doing multiple requests in a test is to use an integration test. It already takes care of a lot of the stuff you’d need to deal with trying to shoehorn this into a functional test. –Matt J. ---
**Author:** ![oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/c0e974/32.png) [@oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/oldbug)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2009, 6:48pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/reinstantiate-controller-during-functional-testing/177310/3 "2009-10-15T18:48:20Z")
Patrick D. wrote: […] > Do folks generally use the default (implied to mean, “blessed by the > Rails developers”) integration tests to test AJAX behavior? Or do > folks use one of the other test platforms out there? Since you asked… I don’t use the default integration tests for _anything_. That’s what Cucumber is for, to my mind. For Ajax, you may need to integrate Selenium into Cucumber (which is possible, but I’ve never had to do it). > I come from a background of “I won’t really understand why test > platform ABC is better than the default until I have fully appreciated > the limitations of the default test platform.” So I will probably > stay with the standard template for unit, functional, and integration > tests until I run into something that just doesn’t work well without > one of the other platforms. True to a point. Have you played around with anything else out there (RSpec?)? > –wpd ## Best, Marnen Laibow-Koser [http://www.marnen.org](http://www.marnen.org) removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid ---
**Author:** ![oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/c0e974/32.png) [@oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/oldbug)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2009, 6:57pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/reinstantiate-controller-during-functional-testing/177310/4 "2009-10-15T18:57:34Z")
On Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:48 PM, Marnen Laibow-Koser [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > Patrick D. wrote: > True to a point. Have you played around with anything else out there > (RSpec?)? > Not yet… My applications and their associated tests have been > trivial and mostly been used as a learning tool for myself. I have > seen references to RSpec, Cucumber, and several other test platforms. I am quite certain that they all address needs that aren’t met by the standard unit/functional/integration tests baked into RoR. But I figure that that, if the standard unit/functional/integration tests are good enough for the RoR developers, they should be good enough for me. I am assuming (of course) that the RoR developers use the standard test templates. If they don’t, then why is that template (still) included in RoR? It’s probably included because it was standard at some point in time, and works well enough for small, simple projects. Which are all I’ve played with so far. As my projects get bigger or more complicated, then I’ll probably run into the same limitations that inspired the other test environments and learn from that process. –wpd ---
**Author:** ![oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/c0e974/32.png) [@oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/oldbug)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2009, 6:40pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/reinstantiate-controller-during-functional-testing/177310/5 "2009-10-15T18:40:00Z")
On Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:27 PM, Matt J. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > It sounds like you’ve got a clear idea what’s going on. > integration test. It already takes care of a lot of the stuff you’d > need to deal with trying to shoehorn this into a functional test. Thanks Matt, As I was writing my email, I started wondering if I should be using an integration test instead of a functional test. (Hence my last question). My understanding of integration tests is that they are geared towards testing a flow of operations across multiple controllers. I always thought of that as “multiple different controllers”, but obviously there is no reason why that has to be the case. I can go fix that. In the mean time (and just in case anybody stumbles over this thread in the future), I found that putting: @controller = LotsController.new in between my two calls to xhr solved my particular problem. Do folks generally use the default (implied to mean, “blessed by the Rails developers”) integration tests to test AJAX behavior? Or do folks use one of the other test platforms out there? I come from a background of “I won’t really understand why test platform ABC is better than the default until I have fully appreciated the limitations of the default test platform.” So I will probably stay with the standard template for unit, functional, and integration tests until I run into something that just doesn’t work well without one of the other platforms. –wpd ---
**Author:** ![oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/c0e974/32.png) [@oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/oldbug)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2009, 7:06pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/reinstantiate-controller-during-functional-testing/177310/6 "2009-10-15T19:06:00Z")
Patrick D. wrote: > On Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 12:48 PM, Marnen Laibow-Koser > [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > > > Patrick D. wrote: > > True to a point. �Have you played around with anything else out there > > (RSpec?)? > > Not yet… My applications and their associated tests have been > > trivial and mostly been used as a learning tool for myself. I have > > seen references to RSpec, Cucumber, and several other test platforms. > > I am quite certain that they all address needs that aren’t met by the > standard unit/functional/integration tests baked into RoR. Not necessarily. Some of them address the same needs, just in different ways. > But I figure that that, if the standard unit/functional/integration > tests are good enough for the RoR developers, they should be good > enough for me. Bad assumption. You’re not the Rails core team. Your needs may be different from those of the Rails core team. > I am assuming (of course) that the RoR developers use the standard > test templates. If they don’t, then why is that template (still) > included in RoR? There’s a lot of crap in Rails because it hasn’t been removed yet (_cough_fixtures_cough_). > It’s probably included because it was standard at some point in time, > and works well enough for small, simple projects. > > Which are all I’ve played with so far. As my projects get bigger or > more complicated, then I’ll probably run into the same limitations > that inspired the other test environments and learn from that process. I wonder. RSpec and Cucumber are good even for small, simple stuff. You’re falling into the trap of assuming that the Rails core team is perfect. > –wpd ## Best, Marnen Laibow-Koser [http://www.marnen.org](http://www.marnen.org) removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid ---
**Author:** ![oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/o/c0e974/32.png) [@oldbug](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/oldbug)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2009, 7:15pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/reinstantiate-controller-during-functional-testing/177310/7 "2009-10-15T19:15:43Z")
On Thu, Oct 15, 2009 at 1:06 PM, Marnen Laibow-Koser [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > I wonder. RSpec and Cucumber are good even for small, simple stuff. > You’re falling into the trap of assuming that the Rails core team is > perfect. 🙂 That may be the case. I prefer to think of it as assuming that the Rails core team has more experience with this sort of thing than I will ever have. I’ll take a closer look at RSpec and Cucumber, especially since you (yet another developer with vastly more experience at this sort of thing than I have) have suggested it (and I have learned to respect your suggestions based on your activity on this list). Thanks for the tips. Please keep them up. –wpd