Rspec::RequestSnapshot

Gold master testing for RSpec API request specs. Make sure API behavior is not changing by taking and storing a snapshot from an API response on a first run and check if they match on next spec runs.

By default, snapshots are stored under spec/fixtures/snapshots and should be code reviewed as well. The syntax is inspired by Jest.

References:

• Gold Master Testing article by CodeClimate
• Jest Snapshot Testing

Add this line to your application's Gemfile:

gem 'rspec-request_snapshot'

And then execute:

$ bundle

Or install it yourself as:

$ gem install rspec-request_snapshot

RSpec.configure do |config|
  # The place where snapshots will be stored
  # Default value is spec/fixtures/snapshots
  config.request_snapshots_dir = "spec/fixtures/snapshots"

  # The json attributes that you want to ignore when comparing snapshots
  # Default value is [id, created_at, updated_at]
  config.request_snapshots_dynamic_attributes = %w(id created_at updated_at)

  # The json attributes that ignore order when comparing nodes
  # Default value is []
  config.request_snapshots_ignore_order = %w(array_node)

  # The default format to use, other formats must be specified using the :format option
  # Default value is :json
  config.request_snapshots_default_format = :json
end

On the first run, the match_snapshot matcher will always return success and it will store a snapshot file. On the next runs, it will compare the response with the file content.

If you need to replace snapshots, run the specs with:

REPLACE_SNAPSHOTS=true bundle exec rspec

If you only need to add, remove or replace data without replacing the whole snapshot:

CONSERVATIVE_UPDATE_SNAPSHOTS=true bundle exec rspec

Note: Conservative update will not work along with ignore_order option. It should only be used when there is no major changes in the snapshots that will be updated.

If you want tests to fail in case a snapshot file does not exist (ie: when running on a CI):

BLOCK_CREATE_SNAPSHOTS=true bundle exec rspec

# Stores snapshot under spec/fixtures/snapshots/api/resources_index.json
expect(response.body).to match_snapshot("api/resources_index")

# Using plain text instead of parsing JSON
expect(response.body).to match_snapshot("api/resources_index", format: :text)

Using dynamic_attributes inline allows to ignore attributes for a specific snapshot. This is useful to ignore changing attributes, like id or created_at. Notice that all nodes matching those (nested or not) will be ignored. Usage:

# Defining specific test dynamic attributes
expect(response.body).to match_snapshot("api/resources_index", dynamic_attributes: %w(confirmed_at relation_id))

Sometimes you don't want to fully ignore an attribute. For example, you want to make sure that generated_id is present and following a given pattern, but that attribute can change randonly, use dynamic_attributes with object/regex notation:

# Example generated_id: ABC-001
expect(response.body).to match_snapshot("api/resources_index", dynamic_attributes: [{ generated_id: /^\w{3}-\d{3}$/ }])

Note: Partial matches are also possible, so use the start/end of line characters for a strict match

It is possible to use the ignore_order inline option to mark which array nodes are unsorted and that elements position should not be taken into consideration.

# Ignoring order for certain arrays (this will ignore the ordering for the countries array inside the json response)
expect(response.body).to match_snapshot("api/resources_index", ignore_order: %w(countries))

Note: If you are using ignore_order for arrays of objects/hashes (ie: [{name: "name", value: "value"}, ...]), it won't perform well depending on the array and hash size (number of keys)

After checking out the repo, run bin/setup to install dependencies. Then, run rake spec to run the tests. You can also run bin/console for an interactive prompt that will allow you to experiment.

To install this gem onto your local machine, run bundle exec rake install. To release a new version, update the version number in version.rb, and then run bundle exec rake release, which will create a git tag for the version, push git commits and tags, and push the .gem file to rubygems.org.

Bug reports and pull requests are welcome on GitHub at https://github.com/CareMessagePlatform/rspec-request_snapshot.

The gem is available as open source under the terms of the MIT License.