Testing Devise with RSpec Request Specs and Capybara

Many questions about testing Devise come up regularly in the freenode/#rspec IRC channel. Often, folks ask how to use RSpec request specs to write integration level ("full stack") tests against Devise.

In integration tests, ideally nothing is mocked or stubbed. Using the recommended setup for controller tests, for instance, is not a good idea in request specs. We want to click links exactly as a user would, fill in forms exactly how a user would, etc...

This post assumes you have a Devise setup running already. If not, start with the Devise README.

First, RSpec request specs can use either Capybara or Webrat. I prefer Capybara. To install, add this line to your Gemfile and run bundle install:

gem 'capybara', :group => :test

Next, add require 'capybara/rspec' to spec/spec_helper.rb:

ENV["RAILS_ENV"] ||= 'test'
require File.expand_path("../../config/environment", __FILE__)
require 'rspec/rails'
require 'capybara/rspec' ### ADD THIS LINE

Finally, RSpec request specs must be created in the spec/requests directory under your Rails root, so create that directory if it does not already exist.

Now you're ready to start writing specs! For example, here's a simple one I named spec/requests/user_registration_spec.rb:

require "spec_helper"

describe "user registration" do
  it "allows new users to register with an email address and password" do
    visit "/users/sign_up"

    fill_in "Email",                 :with => "alindeman@example.com"
    fill_in "Password",              :with => "ilovegrapes"
    fill_in "Password confirmation", :with => "ilovegrapes"

    click_button "Sign up"

    page.should have_content("Welcome! You have signed up successfully.")
  end
end

And here's one to test user sign in, named spec/requests/user_sign_in_spec.rb:

require "spec_helper"

describe "user sign in" do
  it "allows users to sign in after they have registered" do
    user = User.create(:email    => "alindeman@example.com",
                       :password => "ilovegrapes")

    visit "/users/sign_in"

    fill_in "Email",    :with => "alindeman@example.com"
    fill_in "Password", :with => "ilovegrapes"

    click_button "Sign in"

    page.should have_content("Signed in successfully.")
  end
end

Hopefully these serve as a good starting point for your tests.

As you move beyond these basic specs, check out these resources: