Laravel create database when testing

Question

I am trying to run my unit test and create a database during setup. For some reason I am getting the error Unknown database 'coretest'. If I create the database though manually and run the test then I get Can't create database 'coretest'; database exists.

The drop database statement works just now the create database.

Here is my setUP and tearDown methods:

class TestCase extends Illuminate\Foundation\Testing\TestCase {
    /**
     * Default preparation for each test
     */

    public function setUp() {
        parent::setUp();

        DB::statement('create database coretest;');
        Artisan::call('migrate');
        $this->seed();
        Mail::pretend(true);
    }

    public function tearDown() {
        parent::tearDown();
        DB::statement('drop database coretest;');
    }
}

neoascetic · Accepted Answer · 2013-09-27 00:01:32Z

12

The reason why you get this error is simply because laravel tries to connect to database specified in config, which doesn't exist.

The solution is to build your own PDO connection from the settings without specifying database (PDO allows this) and run CREATE DATABASE $dbname statement using it.

We used this approach for testing in our project without any problem.

Here some code:

<?php

/**
 * Bootstrap file for (re)creating database before running tests
 *
 * You only need to put this file in "bootstrap" directory of the project
 * and change "bootstrap" phpunit parameter within "phpunit.xml"
 * from "bootstrap/autoload.php" to "bootstap/testing.php"
 */

$testEnvironment = 'testing';

$config = require("app/config/{$testEnvironment}/database.php");

extract($config['connections'][$config['default']]);

$connection = new PDO("{$driver}:user={$username} password={$password}");
$connection->query("DROP DATABASE IF EXISTS ".$database);
$connection->query("CREATE DATABASE ".$database);

require_once('app/libraries/helpers.php');

// run migrations for packages
foreach(glob('vendor/*/*', GLOB_ONLYDIR) as $package) {
    $packageName = substr($package, 7); // drop "vendor" prefix
    passthru("./artisan migrate --package={$packageName} --env={$testEnvironment}");
}
passthru('./artisan migrate --env='.$testEnvironment);

require('autoload.php'); // run laravel's original bootstap file

edited Sep 27, 2013 at 0:01

answered Sep 9, 2013 at 6:05

neoascetic

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1 Comment

Maytham Fahmi Over a year ago

would this solution work for Laravel 5? and if so any comments to it. thx;)

Ryan Boyd · Accepted Answer · 2015-11-19 15:00:51Z

2

neoascetic has the best answer because essentially you have to boot laravel's database config file again.

So, a clever hack is to create database again after you have dropped it. No need to touch config/database.

public function setUp() {
    parent::setUp();

    Artisan::call('migrate');
    $this->seed();
    Mail::pretend(true);
}

public function tearDown() {
    parent::tearDown();

    DB::statement('drop database coretest;');
    DB::statement('create database coretest;');
}

answered Nov 19, 2015 at 15:00

Ryan Boyd

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Comments

shamaseen · Accepted Answer · 2022-02-24 23:24:59Z

2

create it like this:


public function setUp() {
        parent::setUp();

        $pdo = new PDO(
                "mysql:host=localhost",
                config('database.connections.mysql.username'),
                config('database.connections.mysql.password')
            );
       $pdo->query('CREATE DATABASE test_database');

       // set up the new database as the default
       config()->set('database.connections.mysql.database', 'test_database');
    }

answered Feb 24, 2022 at 23:24

shamaseen

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Comments

Leng · Accepted Answer · 2014-09-25 03:57:03Z

1

I feel like I have a much cleaner way of doing this. Just execute the commands normally through the shell.

$host      = Config::get('database.connections.mysql.host');
$database  = Config::get('database.connections.mysql.database');
$username  = Config::get('database.connections.mysql.username');
$password  = Config::get('database.connections.mysql.password');
echo shell_exec('mysql -h ' . $host . ' -u ' . $username . ' -p' . $password . ' -e "DROP DATABASE ' . $database . '"');
echo shell_exec('mysql -h ' . $host . ' -u ' . $username . ' -p' . $password . ' -e "CREATE DATABASE ' . $database . '"');

answered Sep 25, 2014 at 3:57

Leng

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Comments

Israel Shirk · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-30 05:42:37Z

0

In Laravel 5 it's possible to call migrations internally to the Laravel process which ends up running a good bit quicker than using external commands.

In TestCase::setUp (or earlier), call the migration command with:

$kernel = app('Illuminate\Contracts\Console\Kernel');
$kernel->call('migrate');

answered Aug 30, 2015 at 5:42

Israel Shirk

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1 Comment

Pablo Over a year ago

Why not just use the trait \Illuminate\Foundation\Testing\DatabaseMigrations?

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