Testing with Sequel

Whether or not you use Sequel in your application, you are usually going to want to have tests that ensure that your code works. When you are using Sequel, it’s helpful to integrate it into your testing framework, and it’s generally best to run each test in its own transaction if possible. That keeps all tests isolated from each other, and it’s simple as it handles all of the cleanup for you. Sequel doesn’t ship with helpers for common libraries, as the exact code you need is often application-specific, but this page offers some examples that you can either use directly or build on.

Transactional tests

These run each test in its own transaction, the recommended way to test.

RSpec 1

class Spec::Example::ExampleGroup
  def execute(*args, &block)
    result = nil
    Sequel::Model.db.transaction(:rollback=>:always){result = super(*args, &block)}
    result
  end
end

RSpec 2, <2.8

class RSpec::Core::ExampleGroup
  # Setting an around filter globally doesn't appear to work in <2.8,
  # so set one up for each subclass.
  def self.inherited(subclass)
    super
    subclass.around do |example|
      Sequel::Model.db.transaction(:rollback=>:always){example.call}
    end
  end
end

RSpec 2, >=2.8

# Global around filters should work
RSpec.configure do |c|
  c.around(:each) do |example|
    DB.transaction(:rollback=>:always){example.run}
  end
end

Test::Unit

# Must use this class as the base class for your tests
class SequelTestCase < Test::Unit::TestCase
  def run(*args, &block)
    result = nil
    Sequel::Model.db.transaction(:rollback=>:always){result = super}
    result
  end
end

# Or you could override the base implementation like this
class Test::Unit::TestCase
  alias_method :_original_run, :run

  def run(*args, &block)
    result = nil
    Sequel::Model.db.transaction(:rollback => :always) do
      result = _original_run(*args, &block)
    end
    result
  end
end

MiniTest::Unit

# Add a subclass
# Must use this class as the base class for your tests
class SequelTestCase < MiniTest::Unit::TestCase
  def run(*args, &block)
    result = nil
    Sequel::Model.db.transaction(:rollback=>:always){result = super}
    result
  end
end

# Or you could override the base implementation like this
class MiniTest::Unit::TestCase
  alias_method :_original_run, :run

  def run(*args, &block)
    result = nil
    Sequel::Model.db.transaction(:rollback => :always) do
      result = _original_run(*args, &block)
    end
    result
  end
end

Transactional testing with multiple databases

You can use the Sequel.transaction method to run a transaction on multiple databases, rolling all of them back. Instead of:

Sequel::Model.db.transaction(:rollback=>:always)

Use Sequel.transaction with an array of databases:

Sequel.transaction([DB1, DB2, DB3], :rollback=>:always)

Nontransactional tests

In some cases, it is not possible to use transactions. For example, if you are testing a web application that is running in a separate process, you don’t have access to that process’s database connections, so you can’t run your examples in transactions. In that case, the best way to handle things is to cleanup after each test by deleting or truncating the database tables used in the test.

The order in which you delete/truncate the tables is important if you are using referential integrity in your database (which you should be doing). If you are using referential integrity, you need to make sure to delete in tables referencing other tables before the tables that are being referenced. For example, if you have an albums table with an artist_id field referencing the artists table, you want to delete/truncate the albums table before the artists table. Note that if you have cyclic references in your database, you will probably need to write your own custom cleaning code.

RSpec

class Spec::Example::ExampleGroup
  after do
    [:table1, :table2].each{|x| Sequel::Model.db.from(x).truncate}
    # or
    [:table1, :table2].each{|x| Sequel::Model.db.from(x).delete}
  end
end

Test::Unit

# Must use this class as the base class for your tests
class SequelTestCase < Test::Unit::TestCase
  def teardown
    [:table1, :table2].each{|x| Sequel::Model.db.from(x).truncate}
    # or
    [:table1, :table2].each{|x| Sequel::Model.db.from(x).delete}
  end
end

Testing Sequel Itself

Sequel has multiple separate test suites. All test suites run under either RSpec 1 or RSpec 2.

rake spec

The spec rake task (which is also the default rake task) runs Sequel’s core and model specs. These specs use a mocked database connection, and test for specific SQL used and for generally correct behavior.

rake spec_plugin

The spec_plugin rake task runs the specs for the plugins and extensions that ship with Sequel. These also use a mocked database connection, and operate very similarly to the general Sequel core and model specs.

rake spec_core_ext

The spec_core_ext rake task runs the specs for the core_extensions extension. These are run separately from the other extension tests to make sure none of the other extensions require the core_extensions.

rake spec_bin

The spec_bin rake task runs the specs for bin/sequel. These use an SQLite3 database, and require either the sqlite3 (non-JRuby) or jdbc-sqlite3 (JRuby) gem.

rake spec_adapter (e.g. rake spec_postgres)

The spec_adapter specs run against a real database connection with nothing mocked, and test for correct results. They are slower than the standard specs, but they will catch errors that are mocked out by the default specs, as well as show issues that only occur on a certain database, adapter, or a combination of the two.

These specs are broken down into two parts. For each database, there are specific specs that only apply to that database, and these are called the adapter specs. There are also shared specs that apply to all (or almost all) databases, these are called the integration specs. For database types that don’t have specific adapter tests, you can use rake spec_integration to just run the shared integration tests.

Environment variables

Sequel often uses environment variables when testing to specify either the database to be tested or specify how testing should be done. You can also specify the databases to test by copying spec/spec_config.rb.example to spec/spec_config.rb and modifying it. See that file for details. It may be necessary to use spec_config.rb as opposed to an environment variable if your database connection cannot be specified by a connection string.

Sequel does not create test databases automatically, except for file-based databases such as SQLite/H2/HSQLDB/Derby. It's up to the user to create the test databases manually and give Sequel a valid connection string in an environment variable (or setup the connection object in spec_config.rb).

Connection Strings

The SEQUEL_INTEGRATION_URL environment variable specifies the Database connection URL to use for the adapter and integration specs. Additionally, when running the adapter specs, you can also use the SEQUEL_ADAPTER_URL environment variable (e.g. SEQUEL_POSTGRES_URL for spec_postgres).

Other

SEQUEL_COLUMNS_INTROSPECTION

Whether to run the specs with the columns_introspection extension loaded by default

SEQUEL_CONNECTION_VALIDATOR

Use the connection validator extension when running the specs

SEQUEL_ERROR_SQL

Use the error_sql extension when running the specs

SEQUEL_NO_CHECK_SQLS

Don’t check for specific SQL syntax when running the specs

SEQUEL_NO_PENDING

Don’t mark any specs as pending, try running all specs

SKIPPED_TEST_WARN

Warn when skipping any tests because libraries aren’t available