Can page-object be used outside of Cucumber? - page-object-gem

Question

I am trying to understand what exactly ties the page-object gem to Cucumber.
The page factory is exposed to Cucumbers world which allows the use of on / visit in steps, but this seems to be something that can be exposed without Cucumber.
The #browser variable which page-object relies on is created in a before_suite or before_scenario context in Cucumber but this can also be created without Cucumber.
Is there anything actually tying this gem to Cucumber?

Answer 1

Yes. Page-object gem can be used outside of Cucumber.
Here is an example how you can use it with RSpec.
$ tree
├── Gemfile
├── spec
│   ├── my_app
│   │   └── search_spec.rb
│   ├── pages
│   │   ├── article_page.rb
│   │   └── index_page.rb
│   └── spec_helper.rb
Gemfile
source "https://rubygems.org"
gem 'rspec'
gem 'page-object'
spec_helper.rb
require 'page-object'
Dir["#{File.dirname(__FILE__)}/pages/*_page.rb"].each { |file| require file }
RSpec.configure do |config|
config.include PageObject::PageFactory
config.before do
#browser = Watir::Browser.new :firefox
end
config.after do
#browser.close
end
end
search_spec.rb
require 'spec_helper'
describe 'Search field' do
it 'searches an article' do
visit(IndexPage) do |page|
page.search = 'Ruby'
page.submit_search
end
expect(on(ArticlePage).main_header).to eq('Ruby')
end
end
article_page.rb
class ArticlePage
include PageObject
h1(:main_header)
end
index_page.rb
class IndexPage
include PageObject
page_url 'https://www.wikipedia.org'
text_field(:search, id: 'searchInput')
button(:submit_search)
end

Answer 2

As has been mentioned on rubygems.org PageObject gem has only development dependency on Cucumber. It doesnt need cucumber for implementation. A precise explanation of difference between runtime and development dependencies is given here.
For execution purposes Cucumber looks for step definitions. Passing Page Factory to World adds the PageObject capabilities to Cucumber. The only thing that I can think of tying PageObject to Cucumber are its unit tests. Evmorov has already given a great solution for it to work with Rspec alone.