Using angular.module().controller() with tests

Question

Using angular.module().controller() with tests

I am create my controllers with the module().controller() syntax.

angular.module('App', []);

angular.module('App').controller('PhoneListCtrl', ['$scope', function ($scope) {
    'use strict';

    $scope.phones = [
        {
            "name": "Nexus S",
            "snippet": "Fast just got faster with Nexus S."
        },
        {
            "name": "Motorola XOOM™ with Wi-Fi",
            "snippet": "The Next, Next Generation tablet."
        },
        {
            "name": "MOTOROLA XOOM™",
            "snippet": "The Next, Next Generation tablet."
        }
    ];
}]);

That works great. But now I want to test it with jasmine, and my test respond with "ReferenceError: AppController is not defined".

My test:

/* jasmine specs for controllers go here */
describe('PhoneCat controllers', function () {

    describe('PhoneListCtrl', function () {

        it('should create "phones" model with 3 phones', function () {
            var scope = {},
                ctrl = new PhoneListCtrl(scope);

            expect(scope.phones.length).toBe(3);
        });
    });
});

If I change the controller to a classic function, the test works fine.

What do I missing?

angularjs
jasmine

Answer 1

In your test you should not create controller instances "by hand" but let AngularJS create instances using the $controller service. This is necessary since AngularJS DI system needs to have a chance to inject dependencies.

Your test should roughly look like:

 beforeEach(module('App'));

 it('should create "phones" model with 3 phones', inject(function ($controller, $rootScope) {
    var ctrl = $controller('PhoneListCtrl', {$scope: $rootScope});   
    expect($rootScope.phones.length).toBe(3);
 }));