Capybara with Poltergeist - links with data-method :delete or :patch not triggering

Using Capybara with Poltergeist to click on a link with a data-method='delete' attribute.

Capybara moves on as if the link was successfully clicked, but no actual request hits the server.

Test logs show all the steps leading up to the displayed page ... but no request for the appropriate link.

It finds the correct link with no problem and thinks it's clicked it.

I should point out it's not a :remote link and it works in development

Any ideas?

Here's the code:

scenario "deletes a document", js: true do
  set_auto_accept_for_alert_and_confirm_dialogs
  sign_in_admin admin
  visit admin_dashboard_path
  find(:css, '#mediaDropdown').trigger('click')
  find(:css, '#documents_link').click
  find(:css, "#delete_link_#{document.id}").click
  expect(current_path).to eq admin_documents_path
  expect(Document.all.size).to eq 0
  expect(page).to have_content(I18n.t('notices.admin.documents.destroy.success'))
end

I've extended the wait time, added a long sleep & usedbyebug immediately before the 'delete' link & tried calling it in the console.

Capybara(2.10.1) - Poltergeist(1.11.0) - Rails(4.2.7.1) - jquery-rails(4.2.1) - turbolinks(5.0.1)

Solution

I turned on debugging with:

Capybara.register_driver :poltergeist do |app|
  Capybara::Poltergeist::Driver.new(app, { js_errors: true, debug: true })
end

This raised the javascript error Can't find variable: $ - so jQuery wasn't being loaded.

I checked the test log to see if the javascript file was being called - it was.

I changed the javascript file to change some text on the page - but nothing happened. So the problem appeared to be with the asset pipeline.

In the end, the problem was because a .sprokets-manifest file had been created in the public\assets folder, which was otherwise empty.

I've never pre-compiled the assets on this app, so I've no idea where the manifest file came from.

Deleting the .sprokets-manifest file was an easy fix.