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Ruby Build a Todo List Application with Rails 4 Build a Todo List Application with Rails 4 Write Our First Tests

Asa Smith
Asa Smith
10,009 Points
Posted by Asa Smith
Asa Smith
10,009 Points

Syntax errors when running rspec tests?

rspec failure messages:

 1) Creating todo lists redirects to the todo list index page on success
     Failure/Error: visit "/todo_lists"
     SyntaxError:
       /home/asa/treehouse/projects/odot/app/models/todo_list.rb:3: syntax error, unexpected {, expecting tSTRING_CONTENT or tSTRING_DBEG or tSTRING_DVAR or tSTRING_END
        validates :title. length:{minimum: 3}
                                  ^
     # ./app/controllers/todo_lists_controller.rb:7:in `index'
     # ./spec/features/todo_lists/create_spec.rb:5:in `block (2 levels) in <top (required)>'

  2) Creating todo lists displays an error when the todo list has no title
     Failure/Error: expect(TodoList.count).to eq(0)
     SyntaxError:
       /home/asa/treehouse/projects/odot/app/models/todo_list.rb:3: syntax error, unexpected {, expecting tSTRING_CONTENT or tSTRING_DBEG or tSTRING_DVAR or tSTRING_END
        validates :title. length:{minimum: 3}
                                  ^
     # ./spec/features/todo_lists/create_spec.rb:17:in `block (2 levels) in <top (required)>'

  3) Creating todo lists displays an error when the todo list has a title less than 3 characters
     Failure/Error: expect(TodoList.count).to eq(0)
     SyntaxError:
       /home/asa/treehouse/projects/odot/app/models/todo_list.rb:3: syntax error, unexpected {, expecting tSTRING_CONTENT or tSTRING_DBEG or tSTRING_DVAR or tSTRING_END
        validates :title. length:{minimum: 3}
                                  ^
     # ./spec/features/todo_lists/create_spec.rb:34:in `block (2 levels) in <top (required)>'
Asa Smith
Asa Smith
10,009 Points
Asa Smith
Asa Smith
10,009 Points 
require 'spec_helper'

describe "Creating todo lists" do 
    it "redirects to the todo list index page on success" do
        visit "/todo_lists"
        click_link "New Todo list"
        expect(page).to have_content("New Todo List")

        fill_in "Title", with: "My todo list"
        fill_in "Description", with: "This is what I'm doing today." 
        click_button "Create Todo list"

        expect(page).to have_content("My todo list")
    end

    it "displays an error when the todo list has no title" do
        expect(TodoList.count).to eq(0) 

        visit "/todo_lists"
        click_link "New Todo list"
        expect(page).to have_content("")

        fill_in "Title", with: "My todo list"
        fill_in "Description", with: "This is what I'm doing today." 
        click_button "Create Todo list"

        expect(page).to have_content("error")
        expect(TodoList.count).to eq(0) 

        visit "/todo_lists"
        expect(page).to_not have_content("This is what I'm doing today.")
    end
    it "displays an error when the todo list has a title less than 3 characters" do
        expect(TodoList.count).to eq(0) 

        visit "/todo_lists"
        click_link "New Todo list"
        expect(page).to have_content("")

        fill_in "Title", with: "Hi"
        fill_in "Description", with: "This is what I'm doing today." 
        click_button "Create Todo list"

        expect(page).to have_content("error")
        expect(TodoList.count).to eq(0) 

        visit "/todo_lists"
        expect(page).to_not have_content("This is what I'm doing today.")
    end     


end

4 Answers

Tim Knight
Tim Knight
28,888 Points
Tim Knight
Tim Knight
28,888 Points

Asa,

It looks like you have a syntax error in your validation code in your todo_list.rb model.

See how it's complaining on:

validates :title. length:{minimum: 3}

There's a period after the title when it should be a comma. So just change that to:

validates :title, length:{minimum: 3}

And that should get you there.

Asa Smith
Asa Smith
10,009 Points
Asa Smith
Asa Smith
10,009 Points

Ah geez. I figured it was something simple like that. Thanks for your help.

Asa Smith
Asa Smith
10,009 Points
Asa Smith
Asa Smith
10,009 Points

Now I get this failure:

Failures:

  1) Creating todo lists displays an error when the todo list has no title
     Failure/Error: expect(page).to have_content("error")
       expected to find text "error" in "Todo list was successfully created. Title: My todo list Description: This is what I'm doing today. Edit | Back"
     # ./spec/features/todo_lists/create_spec.rb:27:in `block (2 levels) in <top (required)>'
Tim Knight
Tim Knight
28,888 Points
Tim Knight
Tim Knight
28,888 Points

See your section titled:

it "displays an error when the todo list has no title" do

Notice how underneath that you have:

fill_in "Title", with: "My todo list"

So you're actually giving it a title. It's expecting an error but it's being created successfully. I'd change that to:

fill_in "Title", with: ""