No automatic override for `imports` on standalone components

[jadengis]

Problem

For standalone components, we define compiler scope like

@Component({
  selector: 'app-foo',
  template: `...`,
  standalone: true,
  imports: [SomeComponent, SomeModule]
})
export class FooComponent {}

When using angular testing library, define component compilation scope using the declarations and imports property on the render function.

describe('test', async () => {
  await render(FooComponent, { declarations: [MockSomeComponent], imports: [...]})
})

However, this does not overwrite the imports property of standalone components.

Workaround

It is possible to manually override the imports property on a standalone component using TestBed.

beforeEach(() => {
  TestBed.configureTestingModule({
    imports: [FooComponent]
  })
  TestBed.overrideComponent(FooComponent, {set: {imports: mockImports}})
})

describe('another test', async () => {
  await render(FooComponent, {excludeComponentDeclaration: true})
})

Proposed Solution

Perhaps we can use TestBed.overrideComponent to swap the imports already on a standalone component for the imports array passed into render. Perhaps this can be guarded be a configuration flag like overrideComponentImports.

I might whip up a PR with this idea but just wanted to briefly discuss if this makes sense before putting in the work. Thanks!

[timdeschryver]

I'm in favor of adding a componentImports property.

But I think this could get complicated if a child component also has its own imports that need to be mocked. We should keep that in mind, and try to find a solution for that as well.
To be honest, I'm not sure how to tackle that 😅

[jadengis]

I've taken a first stab at this in #307 and got it working. Would love some feedback on the API. 🙏

But I think this could get complicated if a child component also has its own imports that need to be mocked
I don't think this is a concern because you should be able to simple replace the child component with a mock version and skip all its dependencies.

For something more complicated like rendering with a template where you aren't passing in a specific component to override imports on, it might be possible to iterate through the list of specified imports and override a specific import on each standalone component. Something like:

imports.forEach(token => {
  if(isStandalone(token)) {
    TestBed.overrideComponent(token, {add: {imports: [MockImportComponent]}, remove: {imports: [RealImportComponent})
  }
})

Where you could pass in as an option some bindings of which classes to replace with with mocks.

I honestly don't know how much of a value add that is.

[timdeschryver]

We can tackle it when it becomes a problem 😅.
Iterating over the imports to replace all components might not work though, I was thinking more about an API where you could provide the componentImport for each component individually.

[github-actions]

🎉 This issue has been resolved in version 12.1.0 🎉

The release is available on:

• npm package (@latest dist-tag)
• GitHub release

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