Mocha tests for asynchronous functions

Question

I'm writing a node wrapper to interact with an external api and am having a difficult time testing the asynchronous createJob method. Below is the test case code:

api_key = "test_0dc8d51e0acffcb1880e0f19c79b2f5b0cc"

lob     = require('../src/lob')(api_key)
should  = require("should")
chai    = require("chai")

data = 
  name: "test name"
  to: "Bob"
  from: "Alice"
  object1: "foo"
  object2: "bar"

describe "Job", ->
  @timeout(50000)
  describe "create", ->
    it "should create a job with address_id", (done) ->
      lob.jobs.createJob data, (new_job) ->
        new_job.should.not.be.empty
        new_job['name'].should.equal(data['name'])
        done()

Edit

The above code resolves the issue

duplicate stackoverflow.com/questions/24723374/…

rofrol
– rofrol

2015-08-07 07:11:04 +00:00
Commented Aug 7, 2015 at 7:11 — rofrol
– rofrol, Commented Aug 7, 2015 at 7:11

jcollum · Accepted Answer · 2016-11-01 13:38:26Z

3

(Answer in coffeescript. If you'd like to convert coffee to js use http://coffeescript.org/, then the Try CoffeeScript tab.)

If you're testing asynch code you'll need to use the done pattern:

describe "User", ->
  describe "#save()", ->
    it "should save without error", (done) ->
      user = new User("Luna")
      user.save done

http://visionmedia.github.io/mocha/ under "Asynchronous code". Looks like createJob is returning true because the test is zipping through the code to send the post etc. and saying "yep, I sent all that stuff like you asked!".

I'd recommend Martin Fowler's article on testing asynch js code with mocha: http://martinfowler.com/articles/asyncJS.html.

I've got a chunk of code that tests retrieval of a user from the database (using sinon for stubbing). The real code connects to the db then calls the onSuccess with the user's configuration: onSuccess(config)

  describe 'Config', ->
    orgId = 'a'
    errorHandler = ((msg) -> (throw msg))
    beforeEach ->
      readConfig = sinon.stub(sdl , 'getConfig')
      readConfig.callsArgOnWithAsync(2, configSource, JSON.parse(jsonConfig))
    afterEach ->
      configSource.getConfig.restore()

... later

  configSource.getConfig('520bc323de4b6f7845543288', errorHandler, (config) ->
      config.should.not.be.null
      config.should.have.property('preferences')
      done()
  )

edited Nov 1, 2016 at 13:38

answered Jan 20, 2014 at 18:18

jcollum

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14 Comments

Anconia Over a year ago

I was also thinking that the lob variable needs to be declared globally as well as within the beforeEach function, similarly to how data is declared. I'll have to check this out after work.

jcollum Over a year ago

I'm not sure why it would be -- does it need to be initialized in some way before every run?

Anconia Over a year ago

No, I guess it doesn't - and if that's the case then data doesn't need to be wrapped in the beforeEach function either

jcollum Over a year ago

well it seems likely that you'll have a single data that is used across many tests, I think it's in the right place

jcollum Over a year ago

done is always invoked in your "success" callback. If you post to a site, put your done in the code that fires when the post is done with no error. Actually done would go in the error callback as well, but with a failure. I don't recall how to directly fail a test with mocha, sorry.

|

sospedra · Accepted Answer · 2015-01-16 14:11:47Z

3

Don't consider this like an answer to the op but a bonus for the one marked as correct.

Just to complete @jcollum answer here's the Javascript version of him code:

describe('User', function(){
    describe('#save()', function(){
        it("should save without error", function(done){
            var _user = new User("Moon");
            _user.save;
            done();
        });
    });
 });

It's pretty evident but maybe some newbies would need this addendum.

answered Jan 16, 2015 at 14:11

sospedra

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