_ruby

Example

In RSpec, this metadata and filtered execution is referred to as tags (or tagging).

A tag is a simple key/value pair that can be specified within any test file. Alternatively, you can specify just a key (as a symbol) for the tag.

Here is an example spec file with a :smoke tag applied to the entire file.

# filename: spec/example_spec.rb

require 'selenium-webdriver'

describe 'Login', :smoke do

  before(:each) do
    @driver = Selenium::WebDriver.for :firefox
  end

  after(:each) do
    @driver.quit
  end

  it 'succeeded' do
    # test code goes here
  end

  it 'failed' do
    # test code goes here
  end

end

To run this, you would specify --tag and the tag name (without the :) as a runtime parameter, like so:

rspec --tag smoke

Alternatively, you can ignore tags with a ~ prepended to the tag name.

rspec --tag ~smoke

You can also tag each individual test and specify multiple tags at run time.

# filename: spec/example_spec.rb

require 'selenium-webdriver'

describe 'Login' do

  before(:each) do
    @driver = Selenium::WebDriver.for :firefox
  end

  after(:each) do
    @driver.quit
  end

  it 'succeeded', :smoke do
    # test code goes here
  end

  it 'failed', :wip do
    # test code goes here
  end

end

To run just the smoke tag and negate the wip tag, you would do the following:

rspec --tag smoke --tag ~wip

Please note that if you're running RSpec 2 or earlier, the following config is required:

require 'rspec'
RSpec.configure { |c| c.treat_symbols_as_metadata_keys_with_true_values = true }

Otherwise, you'll have to specify tags using the standard key/value syntax (e.g., :smoke would be smoke: true).

Expected Behavior

• Run the test suite
• The test suite identifies which tests to run based on the tags provided
• Executes the filtered set of tests, ignoring the rest

Summary

By utilizing metadata tags and filtering a set of tests, you have learned to effectively create a dynamic test suite that takes into account all of your tests.

Happy Testing!