RSpec 2 matchers for testing your html.

• for testing complicated html output, for simple matching consider use:
  • assert_select
  • matchers provided out of the box in rspec-rails
  • matchers provided by capybara
• developer-firendly output in error messages
• built on top of nokogiri
• has support for capybara, see below
• syntax is similar to have_tag matcher from old-school rspec-rails, but with own syntactic sugar
• framework agnostic, as input should be String(or capybara's page, see below)

Add to your Gemfile in the :test group:

gem 'rspec-html-matchers'

as this gem requires nokogiri, here instructions for installing it.

so perharps your code produces following output:

<h1>Simple Form</h1>
<form action="/users" method="post">
<p>
  <input type="email" name="user[email]" />
</p>
<p>
  <input type="submit" id="special_submit" />
</p>
</form>

so you test it with following:

rendered.should have_tag('form', :with => { :action => '/users', :method => 'post' }) do
  with_tag "input", :with => { :name => "user[email]", :type => 'email' }
  with_tag "input#special_submit", :count => 1
  without_tag "h1", :text => 'unneeded tag'
  without_tag "p",  :text => /content/i
end

Example about should be self-descriptive, but if not refer to have_tag documentation

Input could be any html string. Let's take a look at these examples:

• matching tags by css:

  # simple examples:
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p')
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag(:p)
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p#qwerty')
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p.qwe.rty')
  # more complicated examples:
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty"><strong>Para</strong>graph</p>'.should have_tag('p strong')
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty"><strong>Para</strong>graph</p>'.should have_tag('p#qwerty strong')
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty"><strong>Para</strong>graph</p>'.should have_tag('p.qwe.rty strong')
  # or you can use another syntax for examples above
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty"><strong>Para</strong>graph</p>'.should have_tag('p') do
    with_tag('strong')
  end
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty"><strong>Para</strong>graph</p>'.should have_tag('p#qwerty') do
    with_tag('strong')
  end
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty"><strong>Para</strong>graph</p>'.should have_tag('p.qwe.rty') do
    with_tag('strong')
  end

• special case for classes matching:

  # all of this are equivalent:
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p', :with => { :class => 'qwe rty' })
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p', :with => { :class => 'rty qwe' })
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p', :with => { :class => ['rty', 'qwe'] })
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p', :with => { :class => ['qwe', 'rty'] })

  The same works with :without:

  # all of this are equivalent:
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p', :without => { :class => 'qwe rty' })
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p', :without => { :class => 'rty qwe' })
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p', :without => { :class => ['rty', 'qwe'] })
  '<p class="qwe rty" id="qwerty">Paragraph</p>'.should have_tag('p', :without => { :class => ['qwe', 'rty'] })

• content matching:

  '<p> Some content&nbsphere</p>'.should have_tag('p', :text => ' Some content here')
  # or
  '<p> Some content&nbsphere</p>'.should have_tag('p') do
    with_text ' Some content here'
  end
  
  '<p> Some content&nbsphere</p>'.should have_tag('p', :text => /Some content here/)
  # or
  '<p> Some content&nbsphere</p>'.should have_tag('p') do
    with_text /Some content here/
  end
  
  # mymock.text == 'Some content here'
  '<p> Some content&nbsphere</p>'.should have_tag('p', :content => mymock.text)
  # or
  '<p> Some content&nbsphere</p>'.should have_tag('p') do
    with_content mymock.text
  end

• usage with capybara and cucumber:

  page.should have_tag( ... )

where page is an instance of Capybara::Session

• also included shorthand matchers for form inputs:

  • have_form
  • with_checkbox
  • with_email_field
  • with_file_field
  • with_hidden_field
  • with_option
  • with_password_field
  • with_radio_button
  • with_button
  • with_select
  • with_submit
  • with_text_area
  • with_text_field
  • with_url_field
  • with_number_field
  • with_range_field
  • with_date_field

and of course you can use the without_ matchers (see the documentation).

You can find more on RubyDoc, take a look at have_tag method.

Also, please read CHANGELOG, it might be helpful.

1. Fork the repository
2. Add tests for your feature
3. Write the code
4. Add documentation for your contribution
5. Send a pull request

• Kelly Felkins
• Ryan Wilcox
• Simon Schoeters
• Felix Tjandrawibawa
• Szymon Przybył
• Manuel Meurer

Copyright (c) 2011-2012 Dmitrij Mjakotnyi

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.