How do I set up a session value in Capybara?

Question

I am developing an app for Shopify and I want to do integration testing.

I need to be able to store some values in the session variable, so that authentication works.

How could I do that?

I use Capybara and Capybara-webkit.

In integration testing, you should log users from the login forms. — apneadiving, Dec 17 '11 at 18:49
That won't work. The key issue is that I am using an external authentication system: Shopify. So Shopify is configured to return a successful log-in to a specific URL. Do see the problem? That URL can't be localhost. That's why I need to fake the log in process, even if I am in Integration testing — Nerian, Dec 17 '11 at 20:53

score 33 · Answer 1 · answered Feb 23 '13 at 23:25

33

The accepted answer suggests rack_session_access. It works by inserting middleware controllers to edit and update the session state, then has capybara visit that page and submit a form with the session data. Very ingenious! But unnecessary if you are using Warden (directly or through Devise).

Warden has a hook on_next_request that gives access to the warden mechanism, which can be used to set session keys directly. I threw this together to bundle it up in rspec:

Create spec/support/inject_session.rb:

module InjectSession
  include Warden::Test::Helpers

  def inject_session(hash)
    Warden.on_next_request do |proxy|
      hash.each do |key, value|
        proxy.raw_session[key] = value
      end
    end
  end
end

In spec/spec_helper.rb include the module in feature specs:

RSpec.configure do |config|
    config.include InjectSession, :type => :feature
end

Then sample use in a spec might be:

   inject_session :magic => 'pixie dust', :color => 'pink' 
   visit shopping_cart_path
   page.should be_all_sparkly_and_pink # or whatever

answered Feb 23 '13 at 23:25

ronen

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@YossiShasho in what way does it not work? it seems to work fine for me, currently with devise 3.2.4 and warden 1.2.3 – ronen Oct 04 '14 at 10:35
I honestly don't remember what went wrong, but i didn't try too hard to resolve it. Just went ahead with the `rack_session_access ` gem suggested above, which worked fine. – Yossi Shasho Oct 05 '14 at 07:49
I would have preferred this solution very much. Did not work unfortunately so I also switched to rack_session_access (Ruby 2.2, Rails 4.2) – awenkhh Jan 23 '15 at 13:37
This also works for me on Rails 4.2, Devise 3.4.1 etc. – Thibaut Barrère Jun 09 '15 at 08:37
Man you make may day better! Working here Devise 4.5.0 and Rails 5.2.1. Thank you! <3 – Washington Botelho Aug 18 '18 at 13:25
I just wanted to mention that we need to ask Rails (at least in Rails > 6) to autoload this new folder. We can do this by adding this line in the `rails_helper.rb`: `Dir[Rails.root.join('spec/support/**/*.rb')].each { |f| require(f) }` – Gustavo G. Mar 09 '22 at 13:57

score 27 · Accepted Answer · answered Nov 08 '12 at 15:42

27

Just found rack_session_access gem and working as a charm.

answered Nov 08 '12 at 15:42

fguillen

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@fguillen how can i use the same for cucumber in shopify app? – Navin Bista Jun 14 '18 at 08:07

score 4 · Answer 3 · answered Apr 08 '12 at 13:50

4

You can use something like VCR or webmock to stub out the call to the external http resource.

answered Apr 08 '12 at 13:50

Brice Stacey

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8

score 4 · Answer 4 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:17

4

As the comment by apneadiving recommends, you should fill the form out "directly" using capybara. Testing using Cucumber might look like this for filling in a login form for authentication (from the Capybara github page):

When /I sign in/ do
  within("#session") do
    fill_in 'Login', :with => 'user@example.com'
    fill_in 'Password', :with => 'password'
  end
  click_link 'Sign in'
  ...
end

If you trying to do something different or are having trouble with the normal login process, this SO question may help.

edited May 23 '17 at 12:17

Community

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answered Dec 17 '11 at 19:42

SnapShot

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That won't work. The key issue is that I am using an external authentication system: Shopify. So Shopify is configured to return a successful log-in to a specific URL. Do see the problem? That URL can't be localhost. That's why I need to fake the log in process, even if I am in Integration testing. – Nerian Dec 17 '11 at 20:52
1

@Nerian see if you can use https://github.com/myronmarston/vcr to record that external request to your local environment, then you can use this method. – Christopher Manning Dec 22 '11 at 07:50

apneadiving · Answer 5 · 2011-12-18T14:44:32.567

3

I fear I bring bad news, but from Capybara's documentation:

Access to session and request is not possible from the test, Access to response is limited.

So you won't be able to test as you expect.

Just thinking: it would be acceptable that you insert some conditional statement in your controller for test purpose.:

 session[:foo] = User.first.id if Rails.env.test?

A better option would be to monkey patch your controller only for your integration tests.

edited Dec 18 '11 at 14:44

answered Dec 18 '11 at 11:36

apneadiving

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3

This is possible, but feels like a code smell - injecting test code into your production application? It would be preferable to re-write your tests, if you can. – Taryn East Mar 14 '16 at 22:32

How do I set up a session value in Capybara?

5 Answers5