Rpsec and Factory Girl not cooperating - ruby-on-rails-4

Question

I'm kind of pulling my hair out on this one. I'm trying to test using rspec and Factory Girl (Ubuntu 13.10 and Rails 4). It seems as if Rspec doesn't see any of the Factory Girl stuff. Here's my spec_helper.rb:
# This file is copied to spec/ when you run 'rails generate rspec:install'
ENV["RAILS_ENV"] ||= 'test'
require File.expand_path("../../config/environment", __FILE__)
require 'factory_girl_rails'
require 'rspec/rails'
require 'rspec/autorun'
require 'capybara/rspec'
Dir[Rails.root.join("spec/support/**/*.rb")].each { |f| require f }
ActiveRecord::Migration.check_pending! if defined?(ActiveRecord::Migration)
RSpec.configure do |config|
config.include FactoryGirl::Syntax::Methods
config.use_transactional_fixtures = true
config.infer_base_class_for_anonymous_controllers = false
config.order = "random"
config.color_enabled = true
config.tty = true
config.formatter = :documentation # :progress, :html, :textmate
end
factories.rb:
FactoryGirl.define do
factory :exercise do
name 'New Exercise'
time 3
reps 7
weight 12
weight_unit 'kg'
factory :aerobic_exercise do
name 'Jumping Jacks'
kind 'Cardio/Aerobic'
end
factory :bodyweight_exercise do
name 'Pushups'
kind 'Bodyweight'
end
factory :cardio_exercise do
name 'Jumping Jacks'
kind 'Cardio/Aerobic'
end
factory :lifting_exercise do
name 'BB Shoulder Presses'
kind 'Weight Lifting'
end
end
end
and my failing spec:
#require 'test/spec'
require 'spec_helper'
describe Exercise do
describe 'Exercise properly normalizes values' do
it 'has weight and weight unit if kind is Weight Lifting' do
let(:exercise) { FactoryGirl.create(:lifting_exercise) }
exercise.should be_weight
exercise.time.should be_nil
end
it 'has time but not weight etc. if kind is Cardio' do
let(:exercise) { FactoryGirl.create(:aerobic_exercise) }
exercise.should be_time
exercise.reps.should be_nil
end
end
end
When I run rspec I get this error:
Failure/Error: let(:exercise) { FactoryGirl.create(:lifting_exercise) }
NoMethodError:
undefined method `let' for # <RSpec::Core::ExampleGroup::Nested_1::Nested_1:0x007f2f013b3760>
HELP!(please)

Answer 1

the let method isn't from FactoryGirl, it's from Rspec, and the issue is that let should not be nested within the it, it's meant to be used outside of it.
Given the way that you've written it, I think you should just use a local variable like this:
describe Exercise do
describe 'Exercise properly normalizes values' do
it 'has weight and weight unit if kind is Weight Lifting' do
exercise = FactoryGirl.create(:lifting_exercise)
exercise.should be_weight
exercise.time.should be_nil
end
it 'has time but not weight etc. if kind is Cardio' do
exercise = FactoryGirl.create(:aerobic_exercise)
exercise.should be_time
exercise.reps.should be_nil
end
end
end
Also, given that you've included FactoryGirl::Syntax::Methods in your spec_helper you don't need to prefix everything with FactoryGirl, you can just call it like this:
exercise = create(:lifting_exercise)
I hope that helps!
-Chad

Answer 2

Your issue is not RSpec and FactoryGirl not playing well together.
let is not part of an example's method group. Notice you have the let inside the it block. This should work
#require 'test/spec'
require 'spec_helper'
describe Exercise do
describe 'Exercise properly normalizes values' do
context 'with a lifting exercise' do
let(:exercise) { FactoryGirl.create(:lifting_exercise) }
it 'has weight and weight unit if kind is Weight Lifting' do
exercise.should be_weight
exercise.time.should be_nil
end
end
context 'with an aerobic exercise' do
let(:exercise) { FactoryGirl.create(:aerobic_exercise) }
it 'has time but not weight etc. if kind is Cardio' do
exercise.should be_time
exercise.reps.should be_nil
end
end
end
end
NOTE context is just an alias for describe.