CakePHP 3.6 Controller Integration Testing - HTTP requests not sent - testing

Question

I am trying to implement controller integration testing in CakePHP 3.6 using its testing tools. I assumed that this would be handled by making a 'real' (as in CURL) HTTP request against the running webserver, but it looks like it isn't. Below is the test case code I'm using.
The problems I'm running into:
The test case is somehow managing to access the controler action,
even when the webserver is not running at all (Apache down and no
dev webserver running).
When running this test, the controller does not have access to
$_SERVER (see below) and any of the $postData defined in the test case appears empty on the controller side.
When I place exit; in the controller code, the whole test case
stops, which suggests that the controller code is run directly, not
via a HTTP request.
Question: How can I make a 'real' HTTP requests when testing controllers, apart from resorting to using CURL and handling the requests manually?
Clearly, I am either not understanding how the controller testing is done, or I'm doing something wrong.
Test case I'm using:
/tests/TestCase/Controller/JobsControllerTest.php
<?php
namespace App\Test\TestCase\Controller;
use Cake\ORM\TableRegistry;
use Cake\TestSuite\IntegrationTestCase;
/**
* App\Controller\JobsController Test Case
*/
class JobsControllerTest extends IntegrationTestCase
{
/**
* Test add method
*
* #return void
*/
public function testAdd()
{
$this->useHttpServer(true);
$this->configRequest([
'headers' => [
'Content-Type' => 'application/json',
'X-Api-Key' => '8f083c8f083c8f083c8f083c'
]
]);
$postData = [
'user_id' => 3,
'job_status' => 'New'
];
$this->post('/jobs/add', $postData);
$this->assertResponseSuccess();
$jobs = TableRegistry::get('Jobs');
$query = $jobs->find()->where(['user_id' => $postData['user_id']]);
$this->assertEquals(1, $query->count());
}
}
The dump of $_SERVER global from the controller that I'm testing:
Array
(
[LS_COLORS] => rs=0:di=01;34 [...]
[LANG] => en_US.UTF-8
[HOME] => /home/tomasz
[TERM] => screen
[PATH] => /usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/snap/bin
[MAIL] => /var/mail/root
[LOGNAME] => root
[USER] => root
[USERNAME] => root
[SHELL] => /bin/bash
[SUDO_COMMAND] => vendor/bin/phpunit --verbose
[SUDO_USER] => tomasz
[SUDO_UID] => 1000
[SUDO_GID] => 1000
[PHP_SELF] => vendor/bin/phpunit
[SCRIPT_NAME] => vendor/bin/phpunit
[SCRIPT_FILENAME] => vendor/bin/phpunit
[PATH_TRANSLATED] => vendor/bin/phpunit
[DOCUMENT_ROOT] =>
[REQUEST_TIME_FLOAT] => 1546631688.0758
[REQUEST_TIME] => 1546631688
[argv] => Array
(
[0] => vendor/bin/phpunit
[1] => --verbose
)
[argc] => 2
)

Answer 1

CakePHP integration tests do not issue actual HTTP requests, they simulate them, it's very fast, allows for certain mocking, inspecting session contents, accessing exception details, etc., all sorts of things that wouldn't really be possible (at least not easily) when using real HTTP requests. If you really need to issue actual requests, then you should look into using other utilities, like for example Codeception (specifically acceptance tests).
When using CakePHP, it is advised that you do not access PHP superglobals directly, but that you retrieve the data from the abstracted APIs provided by CakePHP! Breaking your integration tests is one of the reasons for this. The simulated request will receive a request object that has been prepared with the data from your test case, that is where you need to look it up.
For example if you want to access POST data in your app, maybe in your controller, then you do it like this:
$user_id = $this->request->getData('user_id');
See also
Cookbook > Testing > Controller Integration Testing
Cookbook > Request & Response Objects