title: How can I know when to "refresh" my model object in Rails?
body: <p>Here's part of an integration test that I'm having:</p>
  
  <pre><code>user = User.first
  assert !user.is_active?
  
  get confirm_email_user_url(user),:confirmId =&gt; user.mail_confirmation_hash
  
  assert_equal response.status,200
  # because confirm_email_user_url modifies the activation state of the object
  user = User.first
  assert_equal user.state,"activated"
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I spent the last hour debugging this :). In my initial version, I wasn't reinitializing <code>user</code> after confirm_email_user_url was accessed, and the state was always <code>inactive</code> even though the user was activated. </p>
  
  <p>How do I know if I should "reload" ( lacking of a better name ) my model object? What should I call in order to do so?</p>