Elixir: mix test pointed to describe block line of code runs wrong tests.

[amencarini]

Environment

• Elixir & Erlang versions (elixir --version): 1.5.0, r19
• Operating system: macOS Sierra 10.12.5

As a setup, I have the following file:

defmodule FileLocationTest do
  use ExUnit.Case

  describe "describe 1" do # line 4
    test "test 1" do
      IO.puts "in test 1"
    end
  end

  describe "describe 2" do # line 10
    test "test 2" do
      IO.puts "in test 2"
    end
  end
end

Current behavior

When runningmix test test/file_location_test:4, all tests are skipped.

When runningmix test test/file_location_test:10, the terminal output is in test 1.

Expected behavior

When runningmix test test/file_location_test:4, the terminal output should be in test 1.

When runningmix test test/file_location_test:10, the terminal output should be in test 2.

[josevalim]

For now Mix only allows pointing to the tests themselves, not to describe groups.

[amencarini]

Cool, thanks for coming back to me!

[OvermindDL1]

For now Mix only allows pointing to the tests themselves, not to describe groups.

Hmm, that could be a useful feature though thinking about it. Would you be interested in a PR if anyone did one? (Not me, in another crunch period at work, otherwise if someone reminds me later I can.)

[josevalim]

If someone does it we will be glad to accept it depending on the code complexity.

[dustinfarris]

I am confused by the documentation

https://hexdocs.pm/ex_unit/ExUnit.Case.html#describe/2-examples

mix test --only describe:"String.capitalize/1"

This sort of works for me unless i have spaces in the describe string.

mix test --only describe:"My interesting describe"

results in including tag "My" rather than the whole string.

Including tags: [describe: "My"]
Excluding tags: [:test]

[josevalim]

@dustinfarris what operating system are you using?

[josevalim]

@dustinfarris and can you fix it by including the describe in the quotes?

mix test --only "describe:My interesting describe"

[dustinfarris]

@josevalim no, including the describe in quotes does not change anything. Continues with above behavior.

[dustinfarris]

macOS Sierra, using ZSH shell, elixir 1.4.4

[josevalim]

Then it will be up to escaping in your shell. You need to find a way to quote the arguments such as the command below returns a single list, as shown:

$ elixir -e "IO.inspect System.argv" -- "describe:My test"
["describe:My test"]

[dustinfarris]

That works, but the test command does not :-/