Rails + Cucumber/Capybara: How to set/retrieve cookies in tests?

Question

I'm implementing a lazy login feature. My cucumber feature should describe it:

    Feature: User log in

        Scenario: Lazy login
            Given I didn't log out the last time I was on the site
            When I go to the homepage
            Then I should automatically be logged in 

And these are my step definitions:

Given(/^I didn't log out the last time I was on the site$/) do
  user = FactoryGirl.create(:user)
  visit new_user_session_path
  fill_in('user[email]', with: user.email)
  fill_in('user[password]', with: 'test123')
  click_button('Sign in')

  Capybara.reset_sessions!
end

When(/^I go to the homepage$/) do
  visit root_path
end

Then(/^I should automatically be logged in$/) do #<-- Fails here
  page.should have_content("Logout")
end

This is what happens when a user logs in: the cookies.signed[:auth_token] gets set. This will be used by a before filter in my ApplicationController so that users who open a fresh browser will be logged in automatically:

class SessionsController < Devise::SessionsController

def create
  super
  if user_signed_in?
    puts 'yesssssss'
    session[:user_id] = current_user.id  
    current_user.remember_me! if current_user.remember_token.blank?
    cookies.signed[:auth_token] = {
      :value => current_user.remember_token,
      :domain => "mysite.com",
      :secure => !(Rails.env.test? || Rails.env.development?)
      }
    puts "current_user.remember_token = #{current_user.remember_token}"
    puts 'cookies:'
    puts cookies.signed[:auth_token]
  end
end

end

This is the before filter in my ApplicationController:

def sign_in_through_cookie
  logger.info "logging in by cookie"
  puts "logging in by cookie"
  puts cookies.signed[:auth_token] #<-- PROBLEM: this returns nil.
  return true if !current_user.nil?
  if !cookies[:auth_token].nil? && cookies[:auth_token] != ''
    user = User.find_by_remember_token(cookies.signed[:auth_token])
    return false if user.blank?
    sign_in(user)
    puts 'success'
    return true
  else
    return false
  end
end

So the issue is that in the last step of my cucumber feature, cookies.signed[:auth_token] returns nil. I'm guessing this is just a capybara thing. So do I actually have to set a cookie in the test as opposed to using the one in my controller?

Answer 1

So eventually I figured it out after trying a lot of different things.

Given(/^I didn't log out the last time I was on the site$/) do
  user = FactoryGirl.create(:user)
  visit new_user_session_path
  fill_in('user[email]', with: user.email)
  fill_in('user[password]', with: 'test123')
  click_button('Sign in')

  Capybara.current_session.driver.request.cookies.[]('auth_token').should_not be_nil
  auth_token_value = Capybara.current_session.driver.request.cookies.[]('auth_token')
  Capybara.reset_sessions!
  page.driver.browser.set_cookie("auth_token=#{auth_token_value}")
end

When(/^I go to the homepage$/) do
  visit root_path
end

Then(/^I should automatically be logged in$/) do
  page.should have_content("Logout")
end

UPDATE:

Here's what I use in case I'm using Selenium for some of the tests:

if Capybara.current_session.driver.class == Capybara::Selenium::Driver
  auth_token = page.driver.browser.manage.cookie_named('auth_token')[:value]
  page.driver.browser.manage.delete_all_cookies
  page.driver.browser.manage.add_cookie(:name => "auth_token", :value => auth_token)
else
  puts "cookies = #{Capybara.current_session.driver.request.cookies}"
  Capybara.current_session.driver.request.cookies.[]('auth_token').should_not be_nil
  auth_token_value = Capybara.current_session.driver.request.cookies.[]('auth_token')
  Capybara.reset_sessions!
  page.driver.browser.set_cookie("auth_token=#{auth_token_value}")
end