Comments on: Don’t overwrite Rails’ built-in instance variables http://blog.lrdesign.com/2009/02/dont-overwrite-rails-built-in-instance-variables/ Logical Reality Design: Web Design and Software Development Wed, 14 Jul 2010 20:46:12 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 By: Judson http://blog.lrdesign.com/2009/02/dont-overwrite-rails-built-in-instance-variables/comment-page-1/#comment-2952 Judson Mon, 16 Feb 2009 21:29:24 +0000 http://blog.lrdesign.com/?p=46#comment-2952 Preventing an instance variable being changed isn't something that Ruby can do. You can only access @variable within the context of an instance, but within the instance you can do anything you want with it. Your options are: Update the Rails RSpec contexts to check that the instance variables respond to the right methods so that no matter what ill-informed (for which I'd blame Rails, not a spec writer) modifications are made, a spec fails with a clear indication of the problem ("@request should reply to :env") Remember to use setters for Rails variables: self.request= ... which I'd hope would perform those tests, or construct a proper request for them. Preventing an instance variable being changed isn’t something that Ruby can do. You can only access @variable within the context of an instance, but within the instance you can do anything you want with it.

Your options are:

Update the Rails RSpec contexts to check that the instance variables respond to the right methods so that no matter what ill-informed (for which I’d blame Rails, not a spec writer) modifications are made, a spec fails with a clear indication of the problem (“@request should reply to :env”)

Remember to use setters for Rails variables: self.request= … which I’d hope would perform those tests, or construct a proper request for them.

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