mocking - python mock - patching a method without obstructing implementation

Question

Is there a clean way to patch an object so that you get the assert_call* helpers in your test case, without actually removing the action?

For example, how can I modify the @patch line to get the following test passing:

from unittest import TestCase
from mock import patch


class Potato(object):
    def foo(self, n):
        return self.bar(n)

    def bar(self, n):
        return n + 2


class PotatoTest(TestCase):

    @patch.object(Potato, 'foo')
    def test_something(self, mock):
        spud = Potato()
        forty_two = spud.foo(n=40)
        mock.assert_called_once_with(n=40)
        self.assertEqual(forty_two, 42)

I could probably hack this together using side_effect, but I was hoping there would be a nicer way which works the same way on all of functions, classmethods, staticmethods, unbound methods, etc.

Answer 1

Similar solution with yours, but using wraps:

def test_something(self):
    spud = Potato()
    with patch.object(Potato, 'foo', wraps=spud.foo) as mock:
        forty_two = spud.foo(n=40)
        mock.assert_called_once_with(n=40)
    self.assertEqual(forty_two, 42)

According to the documentation:

wraps: Item for the mock object to wrap. If wraps is not None then calling the Mock will pass the call through to the wrapped object (returning the real result). Attribute access on the mock will return a Mock object that wraps the corresponding attribute of the wrapped object (so attempting to access an attribute that doesn’t exist will raise an AttributeError).

---

class Potato(object):

    def spam(self, n):
        return self.foo(n=n)

    def foo(self, n):
        return self.bar(n)

    def bar(self, n):
        return n + 2


class PotatoTest(TestCase):

    def test_something(self):
        spud = Potato()
        with patch.object(Potato, 'foo', wraps=spud.foo) as mock:
            forty_two = spud.spam(n=40)
            mock.assert_called_once_with(n=40)
        self.assertEqual(forty_two, 42)