How do i get the model from the mocked controller ActionResult method

Question

I have the following:

        SiteViewModel testForm = new SiteViewModel
        {
            SiteID = 0,
            DateCreated = DateTime.Now,
            Name = "A",
        };

        SiteController controller = new SiteController(mockSiteRepository.Object);

        //// Act
        SiteViewModel result = controller.Edit(testForm); // This will not work because Edit is an ActionResult... but I want to get the model that comes out the end of the ActionResult

How do I go about getting the model from the ActionResult method so I can run tests upon it?

Answer 1

You have to cast the ActionResult to a ViewResult . Then you can access the Model property.

// Act
var result = controller.Edit(testForm);

// Assert
var viewResult = result as ViewResult;
Assert.That(viewResult, Is.Not.Null);

var model = viewResult.Model as SiteViewModel;
Assert.That(model, Is.Not.Null);

// do your other assertions.

See this answer for an interesting discussion of the different ActionResult types

If your Edit action only ever returns a ViewResult then you could change its method signature to indicate that. I wouldn't recommend doing this however because it will make your code more brittle, for instance if you want to change the Action's behaviour in the future.