RecordNotFound raised when using find_by_id to get non-existent record in RSpec

Question

I've written this spec in products_controller_spec.rb, that is intended to test a redirect when destroy is called on a non-existent record: ``` it "deleting a non-existent product should redirect to the user's profile page with a flash error" do delete :destroy, {:id => 9999} response.should redirect_to "/profile" flash[:error].should == I18n.t(:slideshow_was_not_deleted) end ``` Here's the controller action in products_controller.rb: ``` def destroy product = Product.find_by_id(params[:id]) redirect_to "profile" if !product if product.destroy flash[:notice] = t(:slideshow_was_deleted) if current_user.admin? and product.user != current_user redirect_to :products, :notice => t(:slideshow_was_deleted) else redirect_to "/profile" end else if current_user.admin? redirect_to :products, :error => t(:slideshow_was_not_deleted) else redirect_to "/profile" end end end ``` Now, I didn't expect the spec to pass first time but I don't understand why it's failing with this: ``` Failure/Error: dele…

Accepted Answer

The RecordNotFound error was being thrown by CanCan. It's not rescue-able from within the controller action (presumably it occurs before the action runs). There were two ways of resolving it -

Changing the spec to:

```
it "deleting a non-existent product should result in a RecordNotFound Error" do         
  product_id = 9999
  expect { delete :destroy, {:id => product_id}}.to raise_error ActiveRecord::RecordNotFound
end
```

or, 2. Patching CanCan like this.

I didn't fancy the patching route, so I went for option 1.

RecordNotFound raised when using find_by_id to get non-existent record in RSpec

Solution

Problem