undefined method `stringify_keys' while using Factory Girl

Question

I have the following block of code in my User_spec.rb:

 @user = { username:'newuser',
           email:'new@user.com',
           fname:'new',
           lname:'user',
           password:'userpw',
           password_confirmation:'userpw'}

for creating a using using these attributes. However while I moved all these attributes to Factories.rb:

require 'factory_girl'

Factory.define :user do |u|
  u.username 'newuser'
  u.email 'new@user.com'
  u.fname 'new'
  u.lname 'user' 
  u.password 'newuserpw'
  u.password_confirmation 'newuserpw'
end

and replace the line in user_spec.rb with:

@user = Factory(:user)

all my tests that related to the User model failed(such as tests for email, password, username etc), all were giving me

"undefined method `stringify_keys' for…"

the new user object

did you reload /exit/reenter your test environment? That has caught me before. — Michael Durrant, Nov 02 '11 at 22:14
@MichaelDurrant i just tried exit/reenter, but the problem insist. thanks anyways — vinc386, Nov 02 '11 at 22:29

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Nov 21 '11 at 16:22

I had a similar problem, and it was because I was passing a FactoryGirl object to the ActiveRecord create/new method (whoops!). It looks like you are doing the same thing here.

The first/top @user you have listed is a hash of values, but the second/bottom @user is an instance of your User ojbect (built by FactoryGirl on the fly).

If you are calling something like this in your specs:

user = User.new(@user)

The first (hashed) version of @user will work, but the second (objectified) version will not work (and throw you the 'stringify_keys' error). To use the second version of @user properly, you should have this in your specs:

user = Factory(:user)

Hope that helps.

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 06 '12 at 02:59

We need to see an example of a failing test to diagnose, but here is one thing that can cause it – sending an object when attributes are required. I once fixed one of my failing tests by changing:

post :create, organization: @organization

to

post :create, organization: @organization.attributes

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered May 30 '14 at 09:31

@rowanu Answered your question, but let me layout my example too for future reference:

What was failing in my case was:

@user = User.new user_attr
@user.bookings_build(Booking.new booking_attr)

Note that I am trying to build with a booking instance and not hash of attributes

The working example:

user_attr_hash    = FactoryGirl.attributes_for(:user)
booking_attr_hash = FactoryGirl.attributes_for(:booking)

@user = User.new user_attr_hash
@user.bookings.build(booking_attr_hash)

And in spec/factories/domain_factory.rb I have

FactoryGirl.define do
  factory :user do
    # DEFAULT USER...
    password "123123123"
    email "factory_girl@aaa.aaa"
    # there rest of attributes set...
  end

  factory :booking do
    start_date Date.today
    end_date Date.today+3
    # the rest of attributes
  end
end

undefined method `stringify_keys' while using Factory Girl

3 Answers3