Rails functional tests, routing error

Question

I'm new to testing, and I'm having some difficulties trying to run a functional test.

I've a messages_controller, and a user_controller here. in the routes, I've defined that the users resources has_many message resources.

Now I'm trying to run a simple test in the messages controller:

def test_index
  get :index, { :user_id => 1 }
  assert_template 'index'
end

But get a routing error from rails, that he cant find a route to messages. I don't want to include a route to messages only because of the tests. How can I tell the test that he must access from the /users/messages url?

the full routes.rb:

ActionController::Routing::Routes.draw do |map|

  map.login  'login',   :controller => :user_sessions, :action => :new
  map.logout 'logout',  :controller => :user_sessions, :action => :destroy
  map.signin 'signin',  :controller => :users,         :action => :new

  map.connect 'search/:action/:word', :controller => :search
  map.connect 'search/:word',         :controller => :search, :action => :index

  map.resources :forums do |forums| 
    forums.resources :forum_posts, :collection => {:preview => :post }, :as => :posts do |post|
      post.resources :forum_posts, :as => :reply
      post.resources :reports
    end
  end

  map.resources :newsitems, :as => :news do |news|
    news.resources :comments do |comment|
      comment.resources :reports
    end
  end

  map.resource :user_sessions
  map.resources :users, 
                :as => :profiles,
                :controller => :profiles,
                :has_many   => [ :messages ]
  map.resource :profiles
  map.resource :me,            
               :controller => :me,
               :has_many   => [ :messages ]


  map.resources :comments, :has_many => [ :reports ]
  map.resources :forum_posts, :has_many => [ :reports ]
  map.resources :reports

  map.home  '/', :controller => :home
  map.root  :controller => :home

  map.namespace :admin do |admin|
    admin.namespace :forum do |forum|
      forum.resources :categories
      forum.resources :posts
      forum.resources :forums
      forum.root      :controller => :home
    end
    admin.resources :notices
    admin.resources :users
    admin.workflow  'workflow/:action', :controller => :workflow
    admin.resources :newsitems
    admin.resources :reports
    admin.resources :comments    
    admin.root :controller => :home
  end

  map.connect ':controller/:action/:id'
  map.connect ':controller/:action/:id.:format'
end

UPDATE

I've noticed that every functional test get a routing error. Even the simpliests ones like newsitem. I've no idea why.

Answer 1

I recreated your scenario in a blank rails app with the routing code and and test you specified, and it worked without a problem, as it should. I'll paste my controller code here since that's the only part you left out:

class MessagesController < ApplicationController
  def index
    @messages = User.find(params[:user_id]).messages
  end
end

If yours is doing basically the same thing, then a routing issue could be caused by a conflict in your routing file, which is what I suspect might be the case. Can you post it? FYI, I wrote an article on testing your routes, and that would be a very good idea because it would catch routing errors early, before they interfere with controllers.

Anyway, if you can post your routes I can take a look.

UPDATE: After looking at your routes, there are a couple conflicts. You can have messages as a sub-resource of more than one other resource, but in your messages controller you're going to have to account for the possibility of either a params[:me_id] or params[:profile_id]. It looks like they're both really the user model underneath, so it can be as simple as:

@user = User.find(params[:me_id] || params[:profile_id])

and you'll probably want to abstract that out into a method you call with before_filter.

The other issue is that you have two overlapping profiles routes, and I'm not sure why. I don't think it's a routing error in the test, because tests bypass the routing engine anyway. I think it's an error in the index view, because it probably contains links to messages with improperly formatted urls. If you have a link to a message, for instance, and you have a @profile object, then you'll need to call them like this:

<%= link_to message.name, profile_message_path(@profile, @message) %>

However, if you're using non-nested paths like message_path(@message), it will fail because there are no non-nested message routes.