Testing render template in Grails Integration tests

Recently, I had to write the Integration test cases for a controller and I had extended my test Spec with IntegrationSpec. While writing the test case for action that renders a template with model I came to know that there’s no straight and simple way to test it. For example, action looked like:

class UserController {

static allowedMethods = [save: "POST", update: "PUT", delete: "DELETE"]

def list = {
render(template: 'list', model: [userInstanceList:User.list(params)])
}

// more actions
}

Now, in order to test it, we need to add the following code to the setup method:

UserController.metaClass.render = { Map map ->
renderedMap = map
}

so that the overall test script for the controller looks like:

class UserControllerSpec extends IntegrationSpec{

UserController controller
Map renderedMap

public void setup() {
controller = new UserController()

UserController.metaClass.render = { Map map ->
renderedMap = map
}
}

public void cleanup() {

}

void "test list"(){
when:
controller.list()

then:
renderedMap
renderedMap.template
renderedMap.template.equals('list')
renderedMap.model
renderedMap.model.userInstanceList.size() > 0
}
}

Now, you will be able to get the name of the rendered template with renderedMap.template and the model with renderedMap.model. If your test case renders a view then the view name would be available with renderedMap.view.
You can see the whole working code/application here.