[rspec-users] stuck in testing hell...

[David Chelimsky]

On Tue, May 1, 2012 at 2:17 PM, Patrick J. Collins
<patrick at collinatorstudios.com> wrote:
>> The frustration your experiencing is actually a good thing, its your brain saying "hey something is just not right". Of
>> course our natural reaction to this is just to get angry, but if we can get past that there is an opportunity to learn
>> something important. In my limited experience I've found that listening to tests is one of the best ways to learn. There
>> is probably something seriously wrong with your existing tests and code. So instead of trying to work around it, and get
>> your tests to pass, seize the opportunity and try and work out why your tests and code suck and get to the bottom of the
>> problem. This is a real opportunity to learn something.
>
> I hear you, but honestly these tests are very straight forward and not
> overly complicated in any way, shape, or form.  I did some more
> experimenting and was able to narrow the problem down to:  Serialization and Mocha.

Tests have to run code. Your tests are running already complicated
code (Rails), that is further complicated by introducing
Serialization, and then further complicated by using Mocha. I do these
things too, so I'm not saying they are bad, but they are nothing if
they are not un-straight-forward and complicated. Just because syntax
hides all that complexity from you doesn't make it go away.

FWIW,
David