[rspec-devel] Inverse Thinking, describing behaviors with contexts rather than in contexts

[David Chelimsky]

On Jun 22, 2008, at 12:25 PM, Zach Dennis wrote:

> Two friday's ago I was talking to my pair Cabout a pet peeve I have  
> sometimes. Grouping behaviors by contexts, rather then the inverse.
>
> So I ask you, in regards to describing behavior in a particular  
> context, have you ever entertained the idea of the describing  
> behavior with a particular context?
>
> For example here is an example of describing behavior inside of a  
> context:
>
>   describe Trip
>     context "with no breakfast expenses"
>       it "has $0 for breakfast amount"
>     end
>
>     context "with breakfast expenses" do
>       it "has a breakfast amount which is the sum total of breakfast  
> expenses"
>     end
>   end
>
> And here's an example of describing the behavior with contexts:
>
>   describe Trip
>     behavior "computes breakfast amount" do
>       context "with no breakfast expenses" do
>         it "is $0"
>       end
>
>       context "with breakfast expenses" do
>         it "is the sum of all breakfast expenses"
>       end
>     end
>   end
>
> The difference is subtle, but it inverts how behaviors are  
> described. It also groups contexts for a particular behavior  
> together, rather than grouping the behaviors to a particular context.
>
> It does add another level of verbosity, but it makes my contexts  
> more meaningful because the setup is directly tied to the behavior  
> I'm testing, rather than potentially many behaviors which rely on  
> the same setup.
>
> I'm just thinking out loud at this point, but I'm interested in  
> hearing your thoughts.

Bravo! That's my initial thought.

This all makes sense to me, though there are pros and cons. If you're  
a fan of common setup, this won't work too well. If you're a fan of  
organization/layout for communication, this seems to make sense.

I'm not ready to add behaviour as an alias for context/describe/ 
example_group just yet, but I'd say you should do so in your projects  
- and feel free to write about this in your chapters - just be sure to  
point out both approaches and the pros/cons of each.

Good?