Loading fixtures in django unit tests

Question

I'm trying to start writing unit tests for django and I'm having some questions about fixtures:

I made a fixture of my whole project db (not certain application) and I want to load it for each test, because it looks like loading only the fixture for certain app won't be enough.

I'd like to have the fixture stored in /proj_folder/fixtures/proj_fixture.json.

I've set the FIXTURE_DIRS = ('/fixtures/',) in my settings.py. Then in my testcase I'm trying

fixtures = ['proj_fixture.json']

but my fixtures don't load. How can this be solved? How to add the place for searching fixtures? In general, is it ok to load the fixture for the whole test_db for each test in each app (if it's quite small)? Thanks!

Answer 1

Do you really have a folder /fixtures/ on your hard disk?

You probably intended to use:

FIXTURE_DIRS = ('/path/to/proj_folder/fixtures/',)

Answer 2

Good practice is using PROJECT_ROOT variable in your settings.py:

import os.path
PROJECT_ROOT = os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(__file__))
FIXTURE_DIRS = (os.path.join(PROJECT_ROOT, 'fixtures'),)

Answer 3

I've specified path relative to project root in the TestCase like so:

from django.test import TestCase

class MyTestCase(TestCase):
    fixtures = ['/myapp/fixtures/dump.json',]
    ...

and it worked without using FIXTURE_DIRS