Can I mock functions with specific arguments using Jest?

Nícolas Iensen picture Nícolas Iensen · Jan 17, 2017 · Viewed 37.7k times · Source

I would like to mock a function with Jest, but only if it is called with specific arguments, for example:

function sum(x, y) {
  return x + y;
}

// mock sum(1, 1) to return 4
sum(1, 1) // returns 4 (mocked)
sum(1, 2) // returns 3 (not mocked)

There is a similar feature implemented in the Ruby's RSpec library:

class Math
  def self.sum(x, y)
    return x + y
  end
end

allow(Math).to receive(:sum).with(1, 1).and_return(4)
Math.sum(1, 1) # returns 4 (mocked)
Math.sum(1, 2) # returns 3 (not mocked)

What I'm trying to achieve in my tests is a better decoupling, let's say I want to test a function that relies on sum:

function sum2(x) {
  return sum(x, 2);
}

// I don't want to depend on the sum implementation in my tests, 
// so I would like to mock sum(1, 2) to be "anything I want", 
// and so be able to test:

expect(sum2(1)).toBe("anything I want");

// If this test passes, I've the guarantee that sum2(x) is returning
// sum(x, 2), but I don't have to know what sum(x, 2) should return

I know that there is a way to implement this by doing something like:

sum = jest.fn(function (x, y) {
  if (x === 1 && y === 2) {
    return "anything I want";
  } else {
    return sum(x, y);
  }
});

expect(sum2(1)).toBe("anything I want");

But it would be nice if we had some sugar function to simplify it.

Does it sounds reasonable? Do we already have this feature in Jest?

Thanks for your feedback.

Answer

STeve Shary picture STeve Shary · Mar 14, 2018

I found this library that a colleague of mine wrote recently: jest-when

import { when } from 'jest-when';

const fn = jest.fn();
when(fn).calledWith(1).mockReturnValue('yay!');

const result = fn(1);
expect(result).toEqual('yay!');

Here's the library: https://github.com/timkindberg/jest-when