Ruby
Tests that make real HTTP requests are slow, flaky, and dependent on external services staying available. VCR and WebMock solve this by intercepting HTTP requests and either returning pre-recorded responses or raising errors when unexpected network calls happen. This guide covers both tools, when to use each, and how to
Ruby
Rails system tests let you test your application through a real browser, exercising JavaScript, authentication flows, and multi-step user interactions that unit tests cannot reach. They use Capybara as the test DSL and Selenium WebDriver to control Chrome or Firefox. This guide covers writing effective system tests, handling JavaScript interactions,
Ruby
Rails APIs need a different testing approach than HTML applications. There's no browser to drive, no UI interactions — just HTTP requests and JSON responses. RSpec request specs are the right tool: they test the full request/response cycle through Rack middleware without the overhead of a browser. This
Ruby
Minitest ships with Ruby's standard library and powers the default test suite in every new Rails application. It's fast, minimal, and surprisingly capable. Many teams that start with RSpec eventually migrate back to Minitest for its simplicity and performance. This guide covers everything you need to
Ruby
Basic Capybara usage covers maybe 70% of test scenarios. The remaining 30% involves complex browser behaviors: embedded iframes, file downloads, multiple authenticated sessions, custom wait conditions, and browser-specific configuration. This guide covers those advanced patterns. JavaScript Driver Configuration Capybara supports multiple JavaScript drivers. Choosing the right one affects test speed,
Background Jobs
Faktory is a language-agnostic background job server created by Mike Perham (the creator of Sidekiq). Unlike Sidekiq, which is Redis-based and Ruby-only, Faktory is a standalone server with client libraries for Ruby, Go, Python, JavaScript, and other languages. Testing Faktory workers shares concepts with other queue systems but has important
Ruby
RSpec is the most widely used testing framework for Ruby. Its expressive syntax reads almost like natural language, which makes test suites easier to understand and maintain. This tutorial covers the core building blocks: describe, context, it, expect, and matchers. Installing RSpec Add RSpec to your Gemfile: group :test do
Ruby
Ruby developers have two excellent unit testing frameworks to choose from: RSpec and Minitest. Both ship with strong matchers, mock support, and Rails integration. The choice is mostly about style preference, but there are real differences worth understanding. Overview RSpec is a Behavior-Driven Development (BDD) framework. It emphasizes human-readable test
Ruby
shoulda-matchers provides a collection of one-liner matchers for testing common Rails patterns: validations, associations, and controller behavior. Instead of writing multi-line setup to test validates :name, presence: true, you write one line: it { is_expected.to validate_presence_of(:name) }. This guide covers setup, all major matchers, and best practices
Ruby
RSpec integrates deeply with Rails through the rspec-rails gem. It provides spec types tuned for each layer of a Rails application: model specs, request specs, system specs, and more. This guide shows you how to set up rspec-rails and write effective tests for all three layers. Setup Add to your
Ruby
factory_bot (formerly FactoryGirl) is the standard library for managing test data in Ruby on Rails applications. Instead of manually building objects in each test, you define factories once and reuse them everywhere. The result: cleaner tests, consistent data, and less setup noise. Why factory_bot? Consider two approaches to
Ruby
Capybara is the standard Ruby library for simulating browser interactions in tests. It's the engine behind Rails system specs and RSpec feature specs. Instead of asserting on raw HTML, you interact with your app the way a user would: clicking buttons, filling forms, navigating pages. How Capybara Works