How do I make config.exceptions_app work with rspe

Question

In my Rails 3.2 app, I'm trying to use config.exceptions_app to route exceptions through the routing table to render error-specific pages (especially one for 401 Forbidden). Here's what I've got so far for configuration:

# application.rb
config.action_dispatch.rescue_responses.merge!('Error::Forbidden' => :forbidden)
config.exceptions_app = ->(env) { ErrorsController.action(:show).call(env) }

# development.rb
config.consider_all_requests_local       = false

# test.rb
config.consider_all_requests_local       = false

And now the meat of the matter:

module Error
  class Forbidden < StandardError
  end
end

class ErrorsController < ApplicationController
  layout 'error'

  def show
    exception       = env['action_dispatch.exception']
    status_code     = ActionDispatch::ExceptionWrapper.new(env, exception).status_code
    rescue_response = ActionDispatch::ExceptionWrapper.rescue_responses[exception.class.name]

    render :action => rescue_response, :status => status_code, :formats => [:html]
  end

  def forbidden
    render :status => :forbidden, :formats => [:html]
  end
end

When I want to render that 401 response, I simply raise Error::Forbidden which, in the development environment works perfectly. But when running an example in rspec, e.g.:

it 'should return http forbidden' do
  put :update, :id => 12342343343
  response.should be_forbidden
end

it fails miserably:

1) UsersController PUT update when attempting to edit another record should return http forbidden
   Failure/Error: put :update, :id => 12342343343
   Error::Forbidden:
     Error::Forbidden

Could someone help me understand why this doesn't work in my test environment? I could put a #rescue_from in ApplicationController, but if I have to do that to get my tests working, I'm not sure what the point of using config.exceptions_app is in the first place. :-\

EDIT: As a workaround, I wound up putting the following at the end of config/environments/test.rb It's hecka gross, but seems to work okay.

module Error
  def self.included(base)
    _not_found = -> do
      render :status => :not_found, :text => 'not found'
    end

    _forbidden = -> do
      render :status => :forbidden, :text => 'forbidden'
    end

    base.class_eval do
      rescue_from 'ActiveRecord::RecordNotFound', :with => _not_found
      rescue_from 'ActionController::UnknownController', :with => _not_found
      rescue_from 'AbstractController::ActionNotFound', :with => _not_found
      rescue_from 'ActionController::RoutingError', :with => _not_found
      rescue_from 'Error::Forbidden', :with => _forbidden
    end
  end
end

Answer 1

In config/environments/test.rb set:

config.action_dispatch.show_exceptions = true

Answer 2

I had the same issue. Be careful where you raise your exception. If it is in a before_filter / before_action, your exception will be swallowed. Move your finder code to the actual method and your exception should show up in your specs.