Database configuration using rspec-Rails

Question

In my spec/rails_helper.Rb I added the following code so that the database was automatically created when running rspec:

def database_exists?
  ActiveRecord::Base.connection rescue ActiveRecord::NoDatabaseError ? false : true
end
unless database_exists?
  ActiveRecord::Base.establish_connection(:"#{ENV['RAILS_ENV']}")
  db_config = ActiveRecord::Base.configurations[ENV['RAILS_ENV']]
  ActiveRecord::Base.connection.create_database db_config
end

but when executing rspec I have the following error:

.rbenv/versions/2.2.1/lib/ruby/Gems/2.2.0/Gems/activerecord-4.2.1/lib/active_record/connection_adapters/mysql2_adapter.Rb:23:in `Rescue in mysql2_connection': Unknown database 'my-db-test' (Activerecord::Nodatabaseerror)

You weren’t supposed to create the database?

If I put system('rake db:create') works, but it’s good practice to do it?

Answer 1

There is a rake task to prepare the test bench:

bundle exec rake db:test:prepare

This command creates the database, runs migrations and loads the schema. From there you can run the test suite.