node.jstestingreactjsjsdomreactjs-testutils

Calling setState in jsdom-based tests causing "Cannot render markup in a worker thread" error

I'm testing my React components under jsdom using my own tiny "virtual browser" utility. Works just fine, until I'm trying to setState. For example, when testing a children ages input control:

describe('rendering according to the draft value', function () {
    var component;

    beforeEach(function () {
        component = TestUtils.renderIntoDocument(
            React.createElement(ChildrenInput, {value: []})
        );

        component.setState({draft: [{age: null}, {age: null}]}, done);
    });

    it('overrides the value property for the count', function () {
        assert.strictEqual(component.refs.count.props.value, 2);
    });

    it('overrides the value property for the ages', function () {
        assert.strictEqual(component.refs.age1.props.value, null);
    });
});

…on the setState line I'm getting:

Uncaught Error: Invariant Violation: dangerouslyRenderMarkup(...): Cannot render markup in a worker thread. Make sure window and document are available globally before requiring React when unit testing or use React.renderToString for server rendering.

I know that window and document globals are indeed set by the jsdom-based TestBrowser, like that:

global.document = jsdom.jsdom('<html><body></body></html>', jsdom.level(1, 'core'));
global.window = global.document.parentWindow;

I even tried to wrap setState into a setTimeout(..., 0). It doesn't help. How can I make testing the state changes work?

Solution

  • At load time React determines if it can use DOM, and stores it as a boolean.

    var canUseDOM = !!(
  typeof window !== 'undefined' &&
  window.document &&
  window.document.createElement
);
ExecutionEnvironment.canUseDOM = canUseDOM;

    This means that if it's loaded before those conditions will be true, it assumes it can't use DOM.

    You could monkey patch it in your beforeEach.

    require('fbjs/lib/ExecutionEnvironment').canUseDOM = true

    Or you could fake it at first:

    global.window = {}; global.window.document = {createElement: function(){}};

    Or ensure that you don't load React before you set up JSDOM, which is the only way I'm positive about, but it's also the most difficult and bug prone.

    Or you could report this as an issue, or inspect jest's source and see how it resolves it.