Release Notes

Note

As of 3.0.0, the ReleaseNotes.md file has been deprecated. Please refer to the release notes available on Github. Or the release notes on the chaijs.com website.

2.3.0 / 2015-04-26

Added ownPropertyDescriptor assertion:

expect('test').to.have.ownPropertyDescriptor('length');
expect('test').to.have.ownPropertyDescriptor('length', { enumerable: false, configurable: false, writable: false, value: 4 });
expect('test').not.to.have.ownPropertyDescriptor('length', { enumerable: false, configurable: false, writable: false, value: 3 });
expect('test').ownPropertyDescriptor('length').to.have.property('enumerable', false);
expect('test').ownPropertyDescriptor('length').to.have.keys('value');

Community Contributions

Code Features & Fixes

Documentation fixes

2.2.0 / 2015-03-26

Deep property strings can now be escaped using \\ - for example:

var deepCss = { '.link': { '[target]': 42 }};
expect(deepCss).to.have.deep.property('\\.link.\\[target\\]', 42)

Community Contributions

Code Features & Fixes

Documentation fixes

2.1.2 / 2015-03-15

A minor bug fix. No new features.

Community Contributions

Code Features & Fixes

2.1.1 / 2015-03-04

Two minor bugfixes. No new features.

Community Contributions

Code Features & Fixes

  • #385 Fix a bug (also described in #387) where deep.property would not work with single key names. By @eldritch-fossicker
  • #379 Fix bug where tools which overwrite primitive prototypes, such as Babel or core-js would fail. By @dcneiner

Documentation fixes

2.1.0 / 2015-02-23

Small release; fixes an issue where the Chai lib was incorrectly reporting the version number.

Adds new should.fail() and expect.fail() methods, which are convinience methods to throw Assertion Errors.

Community Contributions

Code Features & Fixes

2.0.0 / 2015-02-09

Unfortunately with 1.10.0 - compatibility broke with older versions because of the addChainableNoop. This change has been reverted.

Any plugins using addChainableNoop should cease to do so.

Any developers wishing for this behaviour can use dirty-chai by @joshperry

Community Contributions

Code Features & Fixes

Documentation fixes

1.10.0 / 2014-11-10

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • No changes required
  • Plugin Developers:
    • Review addChainableNoop notes below.
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

Noop Function for Terminating Assertion Properties

The following assertions can now also be used in the function-call form:

  • ok
  • true
  • false
  • null
  • undefined
  • exist
  • empty
  • arguments
  • Arguments

The above list of assertions are property getters that assert immediately on access. Because of that, they were written to be used by terminating the assertion chain with a property access.

expect(true).to.be.true;
foo.should.be.ok;

This syntax is definitely aesthetically pleasing but, if you are linting your test code, your linter will complain with an error something like “Expected an assignment or function call and instead saw an expression.” Since the linter doesn't know about the property getter it assumes this line has no side-effects, and throws a warning in case you made a mistake.

Squelching these errors is not a good solution as test code is getting to be just as important as, if not more than, production code. Catching syntactical errors in tests using static analysis is a great tool to help make sure that your tests are well-defined and free of typos.

A better option was to provide a function-call form for these assertions so that the code's intent is more clear and the linters stop complaining about something looking off. This form is added in addition to the existing property access form and does not impact existing test code.

expect(true).to.be.true();
foo.should.be.ok();

These forms can also be mixed in any way, these are all functionally identical:

expect(true).to.be.true.and.not.false();
expect(true).to.be.true().and.not.false;
expect(true).to.be.true.and.not.false;

Plugin Authors

If you would like to provide this function-call form for your terminating assertion properties, there is a new function to register these types of asserts. Instead of using addProperty to register terminating assertions, simply use addChainableNoop instead; the arguments to both are identical. The latter will make the assertion available in both the attribute and function-call forms and should have no impact on existing users of your plugin.

Community Contributions

Thank you to all who took time to contribute!

1.9.2 / 2014-09-29

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • No changes required
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

Community Contributions

Thank you to all who took time to contribute!

1.9.1 / 2014-03-19

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • Migrate configuration options to new interface. (see notes)
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

Configuration

There have been requests for changes and additions to the configuration mechanisms and their impact in the Chai architecture. As such, we have decoupled the configuration from the Assertion constructor. This not only allows for centralized configuration, but will allow us to shift the responsibility from the Assertion constructor to the assert interface in future releases.

These changes have been implemented in a non-breaking way, but a depretiation warning will be presented to users until they migrate. The old config method will be removed in either v1.11.0 or v2.0.0, whichever comes first.

Quick Migration

// change this:
chai.Assertion.includeStack = true;
chai.Assertion.showDiff = false;

// ... to this:
chai.config.includeStack = true;
chai.config.showDiff = false;

All Config Options

config.includeStack
  • @param {Boolean}
  • @default false

User configurable property, influences whether stack trace is included in Assertion error message. Default of false suppresses stack trace in the error message.

config.showDiff
  • @param {Boolean}
  • @default true

User configurable property, influences whether or not the showDiff flag should be included in the thrown AssertionErrors. false will always be false; true will be true when the assertion has requested a diff be shown.

config.truncateThreshold (NEW)
  • @param {Number}
  • @default 40

User configurable property, sets length threshold for actual and expected values in assertion errors. If this threshold is exceeded, the value is truncated.

Set it to zero if you want to disable truncating altogether.

chai.config.truncateThreshold = 0; // disable truncating

Community Contributions

Thank you to all who took time to contribute!

Other Bug Fixes

  • #183 Allow undefined for actual. (internal api)
  • Update Karam(+plugins)/Istanbul to most recent versions.

1.9.0 / 2014-01-29

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • No changes required
  • Plugin Developers:
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

Community Contributions

Thank you to all who took time to contribute!

Other Bug Fixes

  • #225 Improved AMD wrapper provided by upstream component(1).
  • #185 assert.throws() returns thrown error for further assertions.
  • #237 Remove coveralls/jscoverage, include istanbul coverage report in travis test.
  • Update Karma and Sauce runner versions for consistent CI results. No more karma@canary.

1.8.1 / 2013-10-10

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

Browserify

This is a small patch that updates the dependency tree so browserify users can install chai. (Remove conditional requires)

1.8.0 / 2013-09-18

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • See deep.equal notes.
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

Deep Equals

This version of Chai focused on a overhaul to the deep equal utility. The code for this tool has been removed from the core lib and can now be found at: chai / deep-eql. As stated in previous releases, this is part of a larger initiative to provide transparency, independent testing, and coverage for some of the more complicated internal tools.

For the most part .deep.equal will behave the same as it has. However, in order to provide a consistent ruleset across all types being tested, the following changes have been made and might require changes to your tests.

1. Strict equality for non-traversable nodes according to egal.

Previously: Non-traversable equal via ===.

expect(NaN).to.deep.equal(NaN);
expect(-0).to.not.deep.equal(+0);

2. Arguments are not Arrays (and all types must be equal):

Previously: Some crazy nonsense that led to empty arrays deep equaling empty objects deep equaling dates.

expect(arguments).to.not.deep.equal([]);
expect(Array.prototype.slice.call(arguments)).to.deep.equal([]);
  • #156 Empty object is eql to empty array
  • #192 empty object is eql to a Date object
  • #194 refactor deep-equal utility

CI and Browser Testing

Chai now runs the browser CI suite using Karma directed at SauceLabs. This means we get to know where our browser support stands... and we get a cool badge:

Selenium Test Status

Look for the list of browsers/versions to expand over the coming releases.

  • #195 karma test framework

1.7.2 / 2013-06-27

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • No changes required.
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

Coverage Reporting

Coverage reporting has always been available for core-developers but the data has never been published for our end users. In our ongoing effort to improve accountability this data will now be published via the coveralls.io service. A badge has been added to the README and the full report can be viewed online at the chai coveralls project. Furthermore, PRs will receive automated messages indicating how their PR impacts test coverage. This service is tied to TravisCI.

Other Fixes

  • #175 Add bower.json. (Fix ignore all)

1.7.1 / 2013-06-24

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • No changes required.
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

Official Bower Support

Support has been added for the Bower Package Manager ([bower.io])(http://bower.io/). Though Chai could be installed via Bower in the past, this update adds official support via the bower.json specification file.

  • #175 Add bower.json.

1.7.0 / 2013-06-17

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • No changes required.
  • Plugin Developers:
    • Review AssertionError update notice.
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated dependencies.

AssertionError Update Notice

Chai now uses chaijs/assertion-error instead an internal constructor. This will allow for further iteration/experimentation of the AssertionError constructor independant of Chai. Future plans include stack parsing for callsite support.

This update constructor has a different constructor param signature that conforms more with the standard Error object. If your plugin throws and AssertionError directly you will need to update your plugin with the new signature.

var AssertionError = require('chai').AssertionError;

/**
 * previous
 *
 * @param {Object} options
 */

throw new AssertionError({
    message: 'An assertion error occurred'
  , actual: actual
  , expect: expect
  , startStackFunction: arguments.callee
  , showStack: true
});

/**
 * new
 *
 * @param {String} message
 * @param {Object} options
 * @param {Function} start stack function
 */

throw new AssertionError('An assertion error occurred', {
    actual: actual
  , expect: expect
  , showStack: true
}, arguments.callee);

// other signatures
throw new AssertionError('An assertion error occurred');
throw new AssertionError('An assertion error occurred', null, arguments.callee);

External Dependencies

This is the first non-developement dependency for Chai. As Chai continues to evolve we will begin adding more; the next will likely be improved type detection and deep equality. With Chai's userbase continually growing there is an higher need for accountability and documentation. External dependencies will allow us to iterate and test on features independent from our interfaces.

Note: The browser packaged version chai.js will ALWAYS contain all dependencies needed to run Chai.

Community Contributions

Thank you to all who took the time to contribute!

1.6.1 / 2013-06-05

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • No changes required.
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required.
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated developement dependencies.

Deep Equality

Regular Expressions are now tested as part of all deep equality assertions. In previous versions they silently passed for all scenarios. Thanks to @katsgeorgeek for the contribution.

Community Contributions

Thank you to all who took the time to contribute!

Additional Notes

  • Mocha has been locked at version 1.8.x to ensure mocha-phantomjs compatibility.

1.6.0 / 2013-04-29

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • No changes required.
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required.
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated developement dependencies.

New Assertions

Array Members Inclusion

Asserts that the target is a superset of set, or that the target and set have the same members. Order is not taken into account. Thanks to @NickHeiner for the contribution.

// (expect/should) full set
expect([4, 2]).to.have.members([2, 4]);
expect([5, 2]).to.not.have.members([5, 2, 1]);

// (expect/should) inclusion
expect([1, 2, 3]).to.include.members([3, 2]);
expect([1, 2, 3]).to.not.include.members([3, 2, 8]);

// (assert) full set
assert.sameMembers([ 1, 2, 3 ], [ 2, 1, 3 ], 'same members');

// (assert) inclusion
assert.includeMembers([ 1, 2, 3 ], [ 2, 1 ], 'include members');

Non-inclusion for Assert Interface

Most assert functions have a negative version, like instanceOf() has a corresponding notInstaceOf(). However include() did not have a corresponding notInclude(). This has been added.

assert.notInclude([ 1, 2, 3 ], 8);
assert.notInclude('foobar', 'baz');

Community Contributions

Thank you to all who took time to contribute!

Other Bug Fixes

  • #142 assert#include will no longer silently pass on wrong-type haystack.
  • #158 assert#notInclude has been added.
  • Travis-CI now tests Node.js v0.10.x. Support for v0.6.x has been removed. v0.8.x is still tested as before.

1.5.0 / 2013-02-03

Migration Requirements

The following changes are required if you are upgrading from the previous version:

  • Users:
    • Update [2013-02-04]: Some users may notice a small subset of deep equality assertions will no longer pass. This is the result of #120, an improvement to our deep equality algorithm. Users will need to revise their assertions to be more granular should this occur. Further information: #139.
  • Plugin Developers:
    • No changes required.
  • Core Contributors:
    • Refresh node_modules folder for updated developement dependencies.

Community Contributions

Thank you to all who took time to contribute!

Other Bug Fixes

  • Improve type detection of .a()/.an() to work in cross-browser scenarios.
  • #116: .throw() has cleaner display of errors when WebKit browsers.
  • #120: .eql() now works to compare dom nodes in browsers.

Usage Updates

For Users

1. Component Support: Chai now included the proper configuration to be installed as a component. Component users are encouraged to consult chaijs.com for the latest version number as using the master branch does not gaurantee stability.

// relevant component.json
  devDependencies: {
    "chaijs/chai": "1.5.0"
  }

Alternatively, bleeding-edge is available:

$ component install chaijs/chai

2. Configurable showDiff: Some test runners (such as mocha) include support for showing the diff of strings and objects when an equality error occurs. Chai has already included support for this, however some users may not prefer this display behavior. To revert to no diff display, the following configuration is available:

chai.Assertion.showDiff = false; // diff output disabled
chai.Assertion.showDiff = true; // default, diff output enabled

For Plugin Developers

1. New Utility - type: The new utility .type() is available as a better implementation of typeof that can be used cross-browser. It handles the inconsistencies of Array, null, and undefined detection.

  • @param {Mixed} object to detect type of
  • @return {String} object type
chai.use(function (c, utils) {
  // some examples
  utils.type({}); // 'object'
  utils.type(null); // `null'
  utils.type(undefined); // `undefined`
  utils.type([]); // `array`
});

For Core Contributors

1. Browser Testing: Browser testing of the ./chai.js file is now available in the command line via PhantomJS. make test and Travis-CI will now also rebuild and test ./chai.js. Consequently, all pull requests will now be browser tested in this way.

Note: Contributors opening pull requests should still NOT include the browser build.

2. SauceLabs Testing: Early SauceLab support has been enabled with the file ./support/mocha-cloud.js. Those interested in trying it out should create a free Open Sauce account and include their credentials in ./test/auth/sauce.json.