Testing Restify services with Mocha-Cakes, and Coffescript, use of done() in async causes timeout issues - testing

Question

I am running into some timing issues with some mocha-cakes test scripts that run against restify services. I'm using the Restify JSON client to issue the calls, which use callbacks rather than promises. I've passed in the done function to my Givens and Whens, so that I can perform the necessary blocking against these async calls, which prevents inconsistent test suite runs (without the dones, it's a tossup which and how many Thens and Ands will pass).
I am moderately skilled with coffescript, and only a novice when it comes to mocha/mocha-cakes, so I am most certainly doing something wrong in my code. Here is an example of a couple of the test cases that are failing:
require 'mocha-cakes'
should = require 'should'
restify = require 'restify'
Feature "Account API",
"In order to have control over structured Account documents",
"as a consumer of investment account information,",
"I need a RESTful service API.", ->
Scenario "GET /account/:userid", ->
client = restify.createJSONClient
url: "http://localhost:8080",
version: "*"
_e1 = null
_r1 = null
_e2 = null
_r2 = null
_d2 = null
# GET non-existent account
Given "I have not yet created the Account", ->
When "I request the Account", (done) ->
client.get "/account/99", (err, req, res, obj) ->
_e1 = err
_r1 = res
done()
err
Then "it should respond with an error", ->
_e1.should.be.ok
And "the status code should be 404", ->
_r1.should.have.status 404
# GET existent account
Given "I have created the Account", (done) ->
client.post "/account", { userId: 1, accountType: 0, accountCategories: [], beneficiaries: [], accountOwner: { firstName: "Test", lastName: "User" } }, (err) ->
done()
err
When "I request the Account", (done) ->
client.get "/account/1", (err, req, res, obj) ->
_e2 = err
_r2 = res
_d2 = obj
done()
err
Then "it should responond with a document", ->
_d2.should.be.ok
And "it should have the userId 1", ->
_d2.userId.should.eql 1
And "it should have an accountOwner property", ->
_d2.accountOwner.should.be.ok
And "the status code should be 200", ->
_r2.should.have.status 200
When I run this, my output is always the following:
c:\Development\Clients\Pensco\AngularJS\Pensco\newaccountwizard.api>mocha
test/AccountAPITests.coffee -r should -R spec --compilers
coffee:coffee-script/register
Feature: Account API
In order to have control over structured Account documents
as a consumer of investment account information,
I need a RESTful service API.
Scenario: GET /account/:userid
◦
- ◊ Given: I have not yet created the Account (pending)
◦
1) When: I request the Account
◦
√ Then: it should respond with an error
◦
√ And: the status code should be 404
◦
2) Given: I have created the Account
◦
3) When: I request the Account
◦
√ Then: it should responond with a document
◦
√ And: it should have the userId 1
◦
√ And: it should have an accountOwner property
◦
√ And: the status code should be 200
6 passing (6s) 1 pending 3 failing
1) Feature: Account API
In order to have control over structured Account documents
as a consumer of investment account information,
I need a RESTful service API.
Scenario: GET /account/:userid ◦ When: I request the Account:
Error: timeout of 2000ms exceeded
at [object Object].<anonymous> (C:\Users\Jon\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\mocha\lib\runnable.js:139:19)
at Timer.listOnTimeout [as ontimeout] (timers.js:110:15)
2) Feature: Account API
In order to have control over structured Account documents
as a consumer of investment account information,
I need a RESTful service API.
Scenario: GET /account/:userid ◦ Given: I have created the Account:
Error: timeout of 2000ms exceeded
at [object Object].<anonymous> (C:\Users\Jon\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\mocha\lib\runnable.js:139:19)
at Timer.listOnTimeout [as ontimeout] (timers.js:110:15)
3) Feature: Account API
In order to have control over structured Account documents
as a consumer of investment account information,
I need a RESTful service API.
Scenario: GET /account/:userid ◦ When: I request the Account:
Error: timeout of 2000ms exceeded
at [object Object].<anonymous> (C:\Users\Jon\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\mocha\lib\runnable.js:139:19)
at Timer.listOnTimeout [as ontimeout] (timers.js:110:15)
Now, I know that my REST calls via client.get/client.post occur almost instantaneously. When I remove the dones, and run without them, with the exception of the first run after restarting my restify service server, usually only the first or second Then/And fails, the rest succeed. There is a timing issue of maybe a few milliseconds, but definitely not 2000ms. I'm curious why my Givens and Whens suddenly start timing out when I throw in the done() calls.
I am pretty sure I am misunderstanding how mocha-cakes is transforming the coffescript Feature->Scenario->Given/When->Then/And/... into describe/it calls. I suspect that somehow the scope within which done applies is larger than it would seem to be given the nature of mocha-cakes script structure...I'm just not sure exactly what that scope is.

Answer 1

I am also not familiar with mocha-cakes. I am using mocha/(lit)coffee to test restify. I have found it convenient to wrap my calls in promises, as latest mocha is promise-aware. Then I don't have to bother with "done". Also note you may need to call res.end() or res.resume() (See this explanation)
For just "GET":
Promise = require('bluebird') # or whatever, I presume
port = 8776 # ditto
getHttpJson = (addr)->
addr = normalizeUrl(addr)
new Promise ( resolve, reject )->
req = http.get(addr, _completeResponse(resolve) )
.on( 'error', reject )
req.end()
General case:
requestHttpJson = (method, addr, data)->
if data?
data = JSON.stringify(data)
urlBits = getUrlBits(addr)
new Promise (resolve, reject)->
req = http.request(
method: method
headers: {
"Content-Type": "application/json" }
hostname: urlBits.hostname
port: urlBits.port
path: urlBits.pathname
, _completeResponse(resolve) )
req.on( 'error', reject )
if data?
req.write( data )
req.end()
postHttpJson = (addr, data)->
requestHttpJson('POST', addr, data)
putHttpJson = (addr, data)->
requestHttpJson('PUT', addr, data)
deleteHttpJson = (addr, data)->
requestHttpJson('DELETE', addr, data)
Break down address into components and add defaults. ("port" is a module global.)
getUrlBits = (addr)->
bits = url.parse(addr)
bits.port = bits.port || port
bits.hostname = bits.hostname || 'localhost'
bits.protocol = bits.protocol || 'http'
return bits
normalizeUrl = (addr)->
url.format(getUrlBits(addr))
Utility to parse body of request & resolve.
_completeResponse = (resolve)->
(res)->
body = []
res.on 'data', (data)->
body.push data
res.on 'end', ->
body = body.join ''
content = if body == '' then null else JSON.parse(body)
resolve([res,content])