Group items tagged

allowing your schema and changes to be database independent.

each migration as being a new 'version' of the database

each migration modifies it to add or remove tables, columns, or entries

roll this migration back, it will remove the table

timestamps macro adds two columns, created_at and updated_at

On databases that support transactions with statements that change the schema, migrations are wrapped in a transaction

reversible

use up and down instead of change

Migrations are stored as files in the db/migrate directory, one for each migration class.

a UTC timestamp identifying

Rails uses this timestamp to determine which migration should be run and in what order

"AddXXXToYYY" or "RemoveXXXFromYYY"

use a Ruby DSL

column type as references

part_number:string:index

a migration to remove a column

"CreateXXX"

change_column_null

AddUserRefToProducts

:references

produce join tables if JoinTable is part of the name

CreateJoinTable

The model and scaffold generators will create migrations appropriate for adding a new model.

enclosed by curly braces and follow the field type

create_table

By default, create_table will create a primary key called id

add an index on the new column

when using MySQL, the default is ENGINE=InnoDB

create_join_table creates an HABTM (has and belongs to many) join table

create_join_table also accepts a block

change_table, used for changing existing tables

remove

rename

add_column

change_column

remove_column

change_column_default

place an SQL fragment in the :options option.

limit

precision

scale

polymorphic

default

index

add_foreign_key

use the old style of migration using up and down methods instead of the change method.

.connection.execute

remove_column is reversible if you supply the column type as the third argument

Complex migrations may require processing that Active Record doesn't know how to reverse

reversible

Using reversible will ensure that the instructions are executed in the right order too.

add_column add_foreign_key add_index add_reference add_timestamps change_column_default (must supply a :from and :to option) change_column_null create_join_table create_table disable_extension drop_join_table drop_table (must supply a block) enable_extension remove_column (must supply a type) remove_foreign_key (must supply a second table) remove_index remove_reference remove_timestamps rename_column rename_index rename_table

:column_options option

have the option :null set to false by default

By default, the name of the join table comes from the union of the first two arguments provided to create_join_table

If the column names can not be derived from the table names, you can use the :column and :primary_key options.

figure out the column name

foreign key for a specific column

foreign key by name

should use reversible or write the up and down methods instead of using the change method

If your migration is irreversible, you should raise ActiveRecord::IrreversibleMigration from your down method.

DontUseConstraintForZipcodeValidationMigration

rails db:migrate

specify a target version

all migrations up to and including 20080906120000

run the down method on all the migrations down to, but not including, 20080906120000

rails db:rollback

db:migrate:redo task is a shortcut for doing a rollback and then migrating back up again

STEP parameter

db:setup task will create the database, load the schema and initialize it with the seed data

db:reset task will drop the database and set it up again. This is functionally equivalent to rails db:drop db:setup.

run a specific migration up or down, the db:migrate:up and db:migrate:down

the RAILS_ENV environment variable

db:migrate VERBOSE=false will suppress all output.

must rollback the migration (for example with bin/rails db:rollback), edit your migration and then run rails db:migrate to run the corrected version.

editing existing migrations is not a good idea.

revert method can be helpful when writing a new migration to undo previous migrations in whole or in part

require_relative

revert

Schema Files for

Schema files are also useful if you want a quick look at what attributes an Active Record object has

annotate_models gem automatically adds and updates comments at the top of each model summarizing the schema if you desire that functionality.

database-independent

multiple databases

you can execute custom SQL statements, the schema dumper cannot reconstitute those statements from the database

db:structure:dump

set in config/application.rb by the config.active_record.schema_format setting, which may be either :sql or :ruby.

check them into source control.

db/schema.rb contains the current version number of the database

Validations such as validates :foreign_key, uniqueness: true are one way in which models can enforce data integrity

The :dependent option on associations allows models to automatically destroy child objects when the parent is destroyed.

Migrations can also be used to add or modify data

Initial

To add initial data after a database is created, Rails has a built-in 'seeds' feature that makes the process quick and easy.

db/seeds.rb

rails db:seed

The timestamps macro adds two columns, created_at and updated_at.

A primary key column called id will also be added implicitly, as it's the default primary key for all Active Record models

On databases that support transactions with statements that change the schema, migrations are wrapped in a transaction

AddXXXToYYY

RemoveXXXFromYYY

Migrations are stored as files in the db/migrate directory, one for each migration class

a UTC timestamp identifying the migration followed by an underscore followed by the name of the migration.

The name of the migration class (CamelCased version) should match the latter part of the file name

Rails uses this timestamp to determine which migration should be run and in what order,

a UTC timestamp identifying the migration

references(also available as belongs_to)

produce join tables if JoinTable is part of the name

The model and scaffold generators will create migrations appropriate for adding a new model

The create_table method is one of the most fundamental

By default, create_table will create a primary key called id

the default is ENGINE=InnoDB

Migration method create_join_table creates a HABTM join table.

By default, create_join_table will create two columns with no options

change_table, used for changing existing tables

execute method to execute arbitrary SQL

The change method is the primary way of writing migrations

migration definitions

write the up and down methods instead of using the change method

view templates are written in a language called ERB (Embedded Ruby) which is converted by the request cycle in Rails before being sent to the user.

Each action's purpose is to collect information to provide it to a view.

A view's purpose is to display this information in a human readable format.

routing file which holds entries in a special DSL (domain-specific language) that tells Rails how to connect incoming requests to controllers and actions.

You can create, read, update and destroy items for a resource and these operations are referred to as CRUD operations

A controller is simply a class that is defined to inherit from ApplicationController.

If not found, then it will attempt to load a template called application/new. It looks for one here because the PostsController inherits from ApplicationController

:formats specifies the format of template to be served in response. The default format is :html, and so Rails is looking for an HTML template.

:handlers, is telling us what template handlers could be used to render our template.

When you call form_for, you pass it an identifying object for this form. In this case, it's the symbol :post. This tells the form_for helper what this form is for.

that the action attribute for the form is pointing at /posts/new

When a form is submitted, the fields of the form are sent to Rails as parameters.

parameters can then be referenced inside the controller actions, typically to perform a particular task

params method is the object which represents the parameters (or fields) coming in from the form.

Active Record is smart enough to automatically map column names to model attributes,

Rails uses rake commands to run migrations, and it's possible to undo a migration after it's been applied to your database

every Rails model can be initialized with its respective attributes, which are automatically mapped to the respective database columns.

migration creates a method named change which will be called when you run this migration.

The action defined in this method is also reversible, which means Rails knows how to reverse the change made by this migration, in case you want to reverse it later

Migration filenames include a timestamp to ensure that they're processed in the order that they were created.

@post.save returns a boolean indicating whether the model was saved or not.

prevents an attacker from setting the model's attributes by manipulating the hash passed to the model.

If you want to link to an action in the same controller, you don't need to specify the :controller option, as Rails will use the current controller by default.

inherits from ActiveRecord::Base

Rails includes methods to help you validate the data that you send to models

Rails can validate a variety of conditions in a model, including the presence or uniqueness of columns, their format, and the existence of associated objects.

redirect_to will tell the browser to issue another request.

rendering is done within the same request as the form submission

Each request for a comment has to keep track of the post to which the comment is attached, thus the initial call to the find method of the Post model to get the post in question.

pluralize is a rails helper that takes a number and a string as its arguments. If the number is greater than one, the string will be automatically pluralized.

The render method is used so that the @post object is passed back to the new template when it is rendered.

it accepts a hash containing the attributes that you want to update.

field_with_errors. You can define a css rule to make them standout

belongs_to :post, which sets up an Active Record association

creates comments as a nested resource within posts

call destroy on Active Record objects when you want to delete them from the database.

Rails allows you to use the dependent option of an association to achieve this.

store all external data as UTF-8

you're better off ensuring that all external data is UTF-8

use UTF-8 as the internal storage of your database

Rails defaults to converting data from your database into UTF-8 at the boundary.

:patch

By default forms built with the form_for helper are sent via POST

The :method and :'data-confirm' options are used as HTML5 attributes so that when the link is clicked, Rails will first show a confirm dialog to the user, and then submit the link with method delete. This is done via the JavaScript file jquery_ujs which is automatically included into your application's layout (app/views/layouts/application.html.erb) when you generated the application.

Without this file, the confirmation dialog box wouldn't appear.

just defines the partial template we want to render

As the render method iterates over the @post.comments collection, it assigns each comment to

use the authentication system

require and permit

the method is often made private to make sure it can't be called outside its intended context.

config/environments/production.rb

Create an additional staging environment that closely resembles the production one

Keep any additional configuration in YAML files under the config/ directory

Rails::Application.config_for(:yaml_file)

Use nested routes to express better the relationship between ActiveRecord models

nest routes more than 1 level deep then use the shallow: true option

namespaced routes to group related actions

Keep the controllers skinny

all the business logic should naturally reside in the model

Share no more than two instance variables between a controller and a view.

using a template

Prefer corresponding symbols to numeric HTTP status codes

without abbreviations

Keep your models for business logic and data-persistence only

Avoid altering ActiveRecord defaults (table names, primary key, etc)

Prefer has_many :through to has_and_belongs_to_many

self[:attribute]

self[:attribute] = value

validates

Consider extracting custom validators to a shared gem

preferable to make a class method instead which serves the same purpose of the named scope

.update_attributes

Override the to_param method of the model

Use the friendly_id gem. It allows creation of human-readable URLs by using some descriptive attribute of the model instead of its id

.find_each

.find_each

Looping through a collection of records from the database (using the all method, for example) is very inefficient since it will try to instantiate all the objects at once

always call before_destroy callbacks that perform validation with prepend: true

When persisting AR objects

Avoid string interpolation in queries

param will be properly escaped

Consider using named placeholders instead of positional placeholders

use of find over where when you need to retrieve a single record by id

use of find_by over where and find_by_attribute

use of where.not over SQL

use heredocs with squish

Use rake db:schema:load instead of rake db:migrate to initialize an empty database

change_column_default

imposing data integrity from the Rails app is impossible

use the change method instead of up and down methods.

constructive migrations

use models in migrations, make sure you define them so that you don't end up with broken migrations in the future

In this case, block will be used by create_table in rollback

Never make complex formatting in the views, export the formatting to a method in the view helper or the model.

When the labels of an ActiveRecord model need to be translated, use the activerecord scope

Separate the texts used in the views from translations of ActiveRecord attributes

config/application.rb config.i18n.load_path += Dir[Rails.root.join('config', 'locales', '**', '*.{rb,yml}')]

I18n.t

I18n.l

Use "lazy" lookup for the texts used in views.

Use the dot-separated keys in the controllers and models

Reserve app/assets for custom stylesheets, javascripts, or images

Third party code such as jQuery or bootstrap should be placed in vendor/assets

Provide both HTML and plain-text view templates

config.action_mailer.raise_delivery_errors = true

Use a local SMTP server like Mailcatcher in the development environment

Provide default settings for the host name

The _url methods include the host name and the _path methods don't

Format the from and to addresses properly

default from:

sending html emails all styles should be inline

Sending emails while generating page response should be avoided. It causes delays in loading of the page and request can timeout if multiple email are sent.

.start_with?

.end_with?

&.

Config your timezone accordingly in application.rb

config.active_record.default_timezone = :local

it can be only :utc or :local

Time.zone.parse

Time.zone.now

Associations are implemented using macro-style calls, so that you can declaratively add features to your models

A belongs_to association sets up a one-to-one connection with another model, such that each instance of the declaring model "belongs to" one instance of the other model.

belongs_to

A has_one association also sets up a one-to-one connection with another model, but with somewhat different semantics (and consequences).

belongs_to

A has_many association indicates a one-to-many connection with another model.

This association indicates that each instance of the model has zero or more instances of another model.

belongs_to

A has_many :through association is often used to set up a many-to-many connection with another model

This association indicates that the declaring model can be matched with zero or more instances of another model by proceeding through a third model.

through:

through:

The collection of join models can be managed via the API

new join models are created for newly associated objects, and if some are gone their rows are deleted.

The has_many :through association is also useful for setting up "shortcuts" through nested has_many associations

A has_one :through association sets up a one-to-one connection with another model. This association indicates that the declaring model can be matched with one instance of another model by proceeding through a third model.

A has_and_belongs_to_many association creates a direct many-to-many connection with another model, with no intervening model.

id: false

The has_one relationship says that one of something is yours

using t.references :supplier instead.

declare a many-to-many relationship is to use has_many :through. This makes the association indirectly, through a join model

set up a has_many :through relationship if you need to work with the relationship model as an independent entity

set up a has_and_belongs_to_many relationship (though you'll need to remember to create the joining table in the database).

use has_many :through if you need validations, callbacks, or extra attributes on the join model

With polymorphic associations, a model can belong to more than one other model, on a single association.

a polymorphic belongs_to declaration as setting up an interface that any other model can use.

In designing a data model, you will sometimes find a model that should have a relation to itself

add a references column to the model itself

All of the association methods are built around caching, which keeps the result of the most recent query available for further operations.

it is a bad idea to give an association a name that is already used for an instance method of ActiveRecord::Base. The association method would override the base method and break things.

belongs_to associations you need to create foreign keys

has_and_belongs_to_many associations you need to create the appropriate join table

So a join between customer and order models will give the default join table name of "customers_orders" because "c" outranks "o" in lexical ordering.

For example, one would expect the tables "paper_boxes" and "papers" to generate a join table name of "papers_paper_boxes" because of the length of the name "paper_boxes", but it in fact generates a join table name of "paper_boxes_papers" (because the underscore '' is lexicographically _less than 's' in common encodings).

id: false

pass id: false to create_table because that table does not represent a model

By default, associations look for objects only within the current module's scope.

will work fine, because both the Supplier and the Account class are defined within the same scope.

To associate a model with a model in a different namespace, you must specify the complete class name in your association declaration:

class_name

class_name

Active Record provides the :inverse_of option

Every association will attempt to automatically find the inverse association and set the :inverse_of option heuristically (based on the association name)

In database terms, this association says that this class contains the foreign key.

In all of these methods, association is replaced with the symbol passed as the first argument to belongs_to.

(force_reload = false)

The association method returns the associated object, if any. If no associated object is found, it returns nil.

the cached version will be returned.

The association= method assigns an associated object to this object.

Behind the scenes, this means extracting the primary key from the associate object and setting this object's foreign key to the same value.

The build_association method returns a new object of the associated type

The create_association method returns a new object of the associated type

raises ActiveRecord::RecordInvalid if the record is invalid.

dependent

counter_cache

:autosave :class_name :counter_cache :dependent :foreign_key :inverse_of :polymorphic :touch :validate

finding the number of belonging objects more efficient.

Although the :counter_cache option is specified on the model that includes the belongs_to declaration, the actual column must be added to the associated model.

:destroy, when the object is destroyed, destroy will be called on its associated objects.

The :inverse_of option specifies the name of the has_many or has_one association that is the inverse of this association

set the :touch option to :true, then the updated_at or updated_on timestamp on the associated object will be set to the current time whenever this object is saved or destroyed

specify a particular timestamp attribute to update

If you set the :validate option to true, then associated objects will be validated whenever you save this object

where includes readonly select

make your code somewhat more efficient

no need to use includes for immediate associations

will be read-only when retrieved via the association

The select method lets you override the SQL SELECT clause that is used to retrieve data about the associated object

using the association.nil?

In database terms, this association says that the other class contains the foreign key.

the cached version will be returned.

:as :autosave :class_name :dependent :foreign_key :inverse_of :primary_key :source :source_type :through :validate

Setting the :as option indicates that this is a polymorphic association

:nullify causes the foreign key to be set to NULL. Callbacks are not executed.

It's necessary not to set or leave :nullify option for those associations that have NOT NULL database constraints.

The :source_type option specifies the source association type for a has_one :through association that proceeds through a polymorphic association.

The :source option specifies the source association name for a has_one :through association.

The :through option specifies a join model through which to perform the query

more efficient by including representatives in the association from suppliers to accounts

When you assign an object to a has_one association, that object is automatically saved (in order to update its foreign key).

If either of these saves fails due to validation errors, then the assignment statement returns false and the assignment itself is cancelled.

If the parent object (the one declaring the has_one association) is unsaved (that is, new_record? returns true) then the child objects are not saved.

If you want to assign an object to a has_one association without saving the object, use the association.build method

collection(force_reload = false) collection<<(object, ...) collection.delete(object, ...) collection.destroy(object, ...) collection=(objects) collection_singular_ids collection_singular_ids=(ids) collection.clear collection.empty? collection.size collection.find(...) collection.where(...) collection.exists?(...) collection.build(attributes = {}, ...) collection.create(attributes = {}) collection.create!(attributes = {})

In all of these methods, collection is replaced with the symbol passed as the first argument to has_many, and collection_singular is replaced with the singularized version of that symbol.

The collection<< method adds one or more objects to the collection by setting their foreign keys to the primary key of the calling model

The collection.delete method removes one or more objects from the collection by setting their foreign keys to NULL.

objects will be destroyed if they're associated with dependent: :destroy, and deleted if they're associated with dependent: :delete_all