In Ruby there’s the DATA constant which contains the lines following
the __END__ keyword in the source file. For some reason RSpec
doesn’t see it.
Here’s the example:
# data_spec.rb
requre 'rspec'
describe 'DATA' do
it 'contains lines following the __END__ keyword' do
DATA.read.should == "Hello from underground!\n"
end
end
__END__
Hello from underground!
If then I run $ rspec data_spec.rb, I’m getting ‘NameError:
uninitialized constant RSpec::Core::ExampleGroup::Nested_1::DATA’.
However, if I use $ ruby data_spec.rb all works fine.
Why RSpec doesn’t see the constant when I use the rspec command? How
can I solve the problem?
In Ruby there’s the DATA constant which contains the lines following
the __END__ keyword in the source file. For some reason RSpec
doesn’t see it.
Here’s the example:
# data_spec.rb
requre 'rspec'
describe 'DATA' do
it 'contains lines following the __END__ keyword' do
DATA.read.should == "Hello from underground!\n"
end
end
__END__
Hello from underground!
If then I run $ rspec data_spec.rb, I’m getting ‘NameError:
uninitialized constant RSpec::Core::ExampleGroup::Nested_1::DATA’.
However, if I use $ ruby data_spec.rb all works fine.
DATA works only on the first file called by the interpreter.
first.rb:
require ‘second’
second.rb:
p DATA.read
END
BAM!
ruby first.rb
./second.rb:1: uninitialized constant DATA (NameError)
from first.rb:1:in `require’
from first.rb:1
ruby second.rb
“BAM!\n”
Why RSpec doesn’t see the constant when I use the rspec command? How
can I solve the problem?
The restriction on DATA notwithstanding, DATA in that context will by
ambiguous. Think about it, is the DATA from the rspec file or the DATA
from the tested file?
Thanks for the explanations, Costi G. I didn’t thought that the DATA
constant isn’t seen by the interpreter if it is in the required file.
The only solution that I can think of right now is the following:
# data_spec.rb
describe 'DATA' do
it 'contains lines following the __END__ keyword' do
data = File.read(__FILE__).split("__END__\n")[-1]
data.should == "Hello from the underground!\n"
end
end
__END__
Hello from the underground!