[rspec-users] Philosophical questions

[Jay Levitt]

On 9/12/2007 3:55 PM, Evan David Light wrote:
>   Disclaimer: The following are observations by a relatively new user 
> (couple of weeks) of RSpec and not intended as RSpec trollbait.  Also, 
> forgive me if similar topics have been discussed elsewhere on the 
> mailing list.  I at least did the due diligence of a quick search.
> 
> That said...
> 
> I've been positively thrilled with RSpec for use outside of Rails.  It 
> has been in my attempts to use it within Rails that I have begun to 
> question whether and how it can buy me much more than Test::Unit.
> 
> I recently began using RSpec to drive the design, in BDD fashion, of a 
> Rails app.  Believing that behavior is best measured from the user's 
> experience, I started by writing a View spec.  I considered this a 
> top-down approach.  Were I still using Test::Unit, I likely would have 
> started in the same place that I usually do out of habit: the Model.
> 
> However, the more googling that I've done, the more that I noticed that 
> most RSpec articles, where they addressed Rails, were primarily focused 
> on the Model.  I began to wonder, "are people using RSpec much like 
> people were using Test::Unit?"  I've seen that some people eschew View 
> Specs <http://tuples.us/2007/08/17/my-life-with-bdd-and-rspec/>.  
> However, in lieu of that, how does one spec the interface that should, 
> in theory, drive the design of the application?
> 
> Ultimately, I'm left with similar perspective to Jordan's: View specs 
> will be brittle.  They'll span multiple Behaviors as there will be at 
> least one per action -- leading me to wonder if BDD, or at least RSpec, 
> is necessarily the best way to try to spec the View.  However, 
> Controllers and Models seem as though they would work reasonably well.   
> 
> Can anyone recommend some approaches for tackling BDD starting from the 
> View down?

I think it's really hard right now for exactly the reasons you mention.

I think Story Runner will make it much, much easier.

Jay