inanzzz | Dealing with dynamic results of behat scenarios with PHP Matcher

Sometimes expected result in a scenario can be dynamic so if we use a static value then the tests would fail. To avoid this problem, we can use PHP Matcher.

Composer.json

Make sure you installed "coduo/php-matcher": "1.1.6" with composer.

Controller

/**
 * @Route("user")
 */
class UserController extends Controller
{
    /**
     * @param Request $request
     *
     * @Route("")
     * @Method({"GET"})
     *
     * @return Response
     */
    public function listAction(Request $request)
    {
        $countries = [
            'GB' => 'Great Britain',
            'DE' => 'Germany',
            'TR' => 'Turkey'
        ];

        return $this->createJsonResponse(array_rand($countries));
    }
}

Feature example

For more place holders like @string@, visit link above.

Feature: Handling dynamic results

  Scenario: I can handle dynamic response content
    Given I am on "/user"
    Then the response status code should be 200
    And the response should contain dynamic json:
    """
    @string@
    """

FeatureContext.php

You can check anything like plain string, json etc. You can use $this->getBrowser()->getLastResponse()->getContent() to get last response as another option.

namespace Application\BackendBundle\Features\Context;

use Behat\Gherkin\Node\PyStringNode;
use Behat\MinkExtension\Context\MinkContext;
use Coduo\PHPMatcher\Factory\SimpleFactory;

class FeatureContext extends MinkContext
{
    /**
     * Checks that response body contains JSON from PyString.
     *
     * @param PyStringNode $jsonString
     *
     * @Then /^(?:the )?response should contain dynamic json:$/
     */
    public function theResponseShouldContainDynamicJson(PyStringNode $jsonString)
    {
        $expectedJson = $jsonString->getRaw();
        $responseJson = $this->getSession()->getPage()->getContent();

        if (null === $expectedJson) {
            throw new \RuntimeException("Can not convert given JSON string to valid JSON format.");
        }

        $factory = new SimpleFactory();
        $matcher = $factory->createMatcher();
        $match = $matcher->match($responseJson, $expectedJson);

        if ($match !== true) {
            throw new \RuntimeException("Expected JSON doesn't match response JSON.");
        }
    }
}

Result

Inanzzz-MBP:football inanzzz$ bin/behat
Feature: Handling dynamic results

  Scenario: I can handle dynamic response content
    Given I am on "/user"
    Then the response status code should be 200
    And the response should contain dynamic json:
      """
      @string@
      """

1 scenario (1 passed)
3 steps (3 passed)
0m5.87s