Rspec with Guard and Spork will not run some tests, and doesn't give verbose error statements for failures

Question

As I added tests to my spec, I became suspicious about every single one passing just as I wrote it, so I added some syntax errors into the code. It turned out, Rspec was not running my recent tests so the syntax errors weren't getting picked up. The comment in the code below shows the arbitrary line at which Rspec stopped showing a green period or red F for a test:

require 'spec_helper'

describe Api::PagesController do
  def valid_session
    {}
  end

  describe "GET index" do
    before :each do
      @page = create(:page)
    end
    it "assigns all pages as @pages" do
      get :index
      assigns(:pages).should eq([@page])
    end
    it "returns json" do
      get :index, format: :json
      expect(response.body).to have_content @page.to_json
    end
  end

  describe "GET show" do
    before :each do
      @page = create(:page)
    end
    it "assigns the requested page as @page" do
      get :show, {:id => @page.to_param}, valid_session
      assigns(:page).should eq(@page)
    end

    it "returns json" do
      get :show, {:id => @page.to_param}, valid_session, format: :json
      expect(response.body).to have_content @page.to_json
    end
  end

  describe "GET new" do
    it "assigns a new page as @page" do
      get :new, {}, valid_session
      assigns(:page).should be_a_new(Page)
    end
  end

  describe "GET edit" do
    before :each do
      @page = create(:page)
    end
    it "assigns the requested page as @page" do
      get :edit, {:id => @page.to_param}, valid_session
      assigns(:page).should eq(@page)
    end

    it "returns json" do
      get :edit, {:id => @page.to_param}, valid_session, format: :json
      expect(response.body).to have_content @page.to_json
    end
  end

  describe "POST create" do
    describe "with valid params" do
      it "creates a new Page in the database" do
        expect {
          post :create, {page: attributes_for(:page)}, valid_session
          }.to change(Page, :count).by(1)
      end

      it "assigns a newly created page as @page" do
        post :create, {page: attributes_for(:page)}, valid_session
        assigns(:page).should be_a(Page)
        assigns(:page).should be_persisted
      end

      #################### TESTS BELOW HERE ARE NOT SHOWN BY RSPEC ##########

      it "returns json" do
        expect{
          post :create, {page: attributes_for(:page)}, valid_session
          }.to have_content page.to_json
      end
    end
    describe "with invalid params" do 
      it "does not save the new page in the database" do
        expect {
          post :create, {page: attributes_for(:page_invalid)}, valid_session
          }.to_not change(Page, :count).by(1)
      end

      #FUTURE TEST - redirects to new page with errors
    end
  end

  describe "PUT update" do
    before :each do
      @page = create(:page)
    end
    describe "with valid params" do
      it "updates the requested page" do 
        Page.any_instance.should_receive(:update_attributes).with({ "title" => "MyString" })
        put :update, {:id => @page.to_param, :page => { "title" => "MyString" }}, valid_session
      end

      it "assigns the requested page as @page" do
        put :update, {:id => @page.to_param, :page => { "title" => "MyString" }}, valid_session
        assigns(:page).should eq(@page)
      end

      it "returns json" do
        put :update, {:id => @page.to_param, :page => { "title" => "MyString" }}, valid_session, format: :jason
        expect(response.body).to have_content @page.to_json
      end

    end

    describe "with invalid params" do
      it "assigns the page as @page" do 
        # Trigger the behavior that occurs when invalid params are submitted
        Page.any_instance.stub(:save).and_return(false)
        put :update, {:id => @page.to_param, page: attributes_for(:page_invalid)}, valid_session
        assigns(:page).should eq(@page)
      end

      #FUTURE TEST - redirects to edit
    end
  end

  describe "DELETE destroy" do
    before :each do
      @page = create(:page)
    end
    it "destroys the requested page" do
      expect {
        delete :destroy, {:id => @page.to_param}, valid_session
      }.to change(Page, :count).by(-1)
    end
  end

  describe "GET published" do
    before :each do 
      @page = create(:page)
      @page_unpublished = create(:page_unpublished)
    end
    it "returns a list of published pages only" do
      get :published, format: :json
      assigns(:pages).should eq([@page])
      expect(response.body).to have_content @page_unpublished.to_json
    end
  end

  describe "GET unpublished" do
    before :each do
      @page = create(:page)
      @page_unpublished = create(:page_unpublished)
    end
    it "returns a list of unpublished pages only" do
      get :unpublished, format: :json
      assigns(:pages).should eq([@page_unpublished])
      expect(response.body).to have_content @page_unpublished.to_json
    end
  end

  describe "GET total_words" do
    before :each do
      @page = create(:page)
    end
    it "returns a list of unpublished pages only" do
      get :total_words, {:id => @page.to_param}, format: :json
      assigns(:total_words).should eq([@page_unpublished])
      expect(response.body).to have_content @page_unpublished.to_json
    end
  end
end

When I intentionally added syntax errors to earlier tests, I saw red Fs instead of the green dots, but no error was being reported. Earlier, when there was an error, I'd see (for example):

16:10:14 - INFO - Running: spec/models/page_spec.rb
Running tests with args ["--drb", "-f", "progress", "-r", "/Users/user/.rvm/gems/ruby-1.9.3-p194/gems/guard-rspec-1.2.1/lib/guard/rspec/formatters/notification_rspec.rb", "-f", "Guard::RSpec::Formatter::NotificationRSpec", "--out", "/dev/null", "--failure-exit-code", "2", "spec/models/page_spec.rb"]...
.......F

Failures:

  1) Page Publishing returns unpublished pages
     Failure/Error: expect(Page.unpublished).to eq [page_unpublished]
     NameError:
       undefined local variable or method `page_unpublished' for #<RSpec::Core::ExampleGroup::Nested_1::Nested_4:0x0000010355b8c0>
     # ./spec/models/page_spec.rb:58:in `block (3 levels) in <top (required)>'

Finished in 0.54212 seconds
8 examples, 1 failure

Failed examples:

rspec ./spec/models/page_spec.rb:57 # Page Publishing returns unpublished pages

Done.

Now, when a test fails, I only see:

17:55:26 - INFO - Running: spec/controllers/pages_controller_spec.rb
Running tests with args ["--drb", "-f", "progress", "-r", "/Users/user/.rvm/gems/ruby-1.9.3-p194/gems/guard-rspec-1.2.1/lib/guard/rspec/formatters/notification_rspec.rb", "-f", "Guard::RSpec::Formatter::NotificationRSpec", "--out", "/dev/null", "--failure-exit-code", "2", "spec/controllers/pages_controller_spec.rb"]...
.....FF..Done.

This change happened at a pretty arbitrary time while coding, I didn't modify the Guardfile or any Spork configuration details. Any idea why this is happening?

Answer 1

It looks like one of the arguments to rspec is --out /dev/null. So your output is being redirected from STDOUT.

One possibility is that this is being caused by one or more bad tests. Have you tried commenting out various tests to see if you can isolate the problematic ones? If you're running your tests in order, I'd start with the ones just before and after the point at which rspec exits prematurely.