How should I test routes and controllers with rspec?

Question

I have just one spec, located at `spec/controllers/statuses_spec.rb` Here is its contents: ``` require 'spec_helper' describe StatusesController do describe "routing" do it "routes to #index" do get("/statuses").should route_to("statuses#index") end end end ``` Suffice to say, I have a simple statuses scaffold, and the statuses controller has the standard actions for CRUD, including an index action. However, I get this failure when running the above test: ``` 15:39:52 - INFO - Running: ./spec/controllers/statuses_spec.rb:6 Run options: include {:locations=>{"./spec/controllers/statuses_spec.rb"=>[6]}} F Failures: 1) StatusesController routing routes to #index Failure/Error: get("/statuses").should route_to("statuses#index") ActionController::UrlGenerationError: No route matches {:controller=>"statuses", :action=>"/statuses"} # ./spec/controllers/statuses_spec.rb:8:in `block (3 levels) in <top (required)>' Finished in 0.21772 seconds 1 example, 1 failure ``` Rspec makes the assumption…

Accepted Answer

Testing routes, especially standard RESTful routes, is not standard practice.

a) You don't want to waste effort retesting Rails' routing functionality

b) Your controller or request specs should fail when they cannot route a request

More often that not, writing and maintaining routing tests does not give much value and increased confidence. Consider testing routes when they become complex and error-prone.

That said, RSpec provides a `route_to` matcher for specifying that a request is routable.

The recommended place for your routing specs is under `spec/routing`, though it's not uncommon to see routing specs alongside controller specs. For example

```
describe VersionsController do
  describe 'routing' do
    it 'routes GET /version to VersionsController#show' do
      expect(get: '/version').to route_to(controller: 'versions', action: 'show')
    end
  end
end
```

The shoulda-matchers gem has its own route matcher, allowing you to write tests such as

```
describe PostsController do
  it { should route(:get, '/posts').to(action: :index) }
  it { should route(:get, '/posts/1').to(action: :show, id: 1) }
end
```

How should I test routes and controllers with rspec?

Solution

Problem