# Testing Rake tasks with RSpec... and Rake

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/testing-rake-tasks-with-rspec-and-rake/187556>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [April 25, 2010, 8:41pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/testing-rake-tasks-with-rspec-and-rake/187556 "2010-04-25T20:41:07Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![johnf](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/848f3c/32.png) [@johnf](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/johnf)\
**Post date:** [April 25, 2010, 8:41pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/testing-rake-tasks-with-rspec-and-rake/187556/1 "2010-04-25T20:41:07Z")

</div>

I’m of the (perhaps misguided) opinion that since Rake tasks are Ruby  
code, they need to be tested. However, I’ve never done this before,  
but thought it was worth looking into. So I wrote a simple RSpec test:

[[[[ ./test/spec.rb  
describe “Rake tasks” do  
require ‘rake’

```
before(:each) do
  @rake = Rake::Application.new
  # @rake.init # Uncomment and this test

```

will blow up.  
# @rake.load\_rakefile() # Uncomment and this test will blowup.  
Rake.application = @rake  
end

```
after(:each) do
  Rake.application = nil
end

it "should have at least one RSpec test to execute" do
  Rake.application["specs"].spec_files.size.should > 0
end

```

end  
]]]]

There is a task called “specs” in my ./Rakefile.rb, which is a  
Spec::Rake::SpecTask that just runs any file matching spec/\*\*/\*.rb. If  
I inspect the Rake::Application instance I get when normally running  
(with --trace), I get this:

#\<Rake::Application:0x9c33154 @tasks={“specs”=\>\<Rake::Task specs =\>  
[]\>}, @rules=[], @scope=[], @last\_description=nil, @name=“rake”,  
@rakefiles=[“rakefile”, “Rakefile”, “rakefile.rb”, “Rakefile.rb”],  
@rakefile=“Rakefile.rb”, @pending\_imports=[], @imported=[],  
@loaders={".rb"=\>#Rake::DefaultLoader:0x9c32e28,  
“.rf”=\>#Rake::DefaultLoader:0x9c32d9c,  
“.rake”=\>#Rake::DefaultLoader:0x9c32d10},  
@default\_loader=#Rake::DefaultLoader:0x9c32ed0,  
@original\_dir="/home/johnf/dev/playground",  
@top\_level\_tasks=[“tests:specs”], @tty\_output=true,  
@options=#\<OpenStruct rakelib=[“rakelib”], trace=true\>\>

Notice the presence of @rakefile=“Rakefile.rb” and that the @tasks  
hash is populated. (You can also see `trace=true` in the @options  
OpenStruct.) However, if I inspect the Rake::Application instance that  
I create inside test/spec.rb, it’s a lot sparser; in particular,  
there’s no Rakefile loaded. Understandably, the spec test then fails,  
saying that the Rake::Application instance doesn’t know how to run a  
task called “specs”.

No problem; the documentation says you need to call `#init` on new  
Application instances to get them primed. When I do that, however, the  
Rake::Application instance inside the spec test exits abruptly, the  
spec task fails, and the outer Rake instance complains “rake  
aborted!”. The stacktrace ends at the spec-test level, presumably  
because --trace isn’t turned on for the inner Rake::Application  
instance. I also tried calling #load\_rakefile() instead, but with  
similarly unpromising results.

I’m a little stumped at this point, and am unable to divine anything  
further from the documentation. What’s the right way to write this  
spec?

~ jf