niczsoft

Some time ago I wrote about complex associations, now time to add another method and corrections.

First the finder_by_sql, in that particular case It was necessary to add

:readonly => true

So the code looks now like this:

  has_many :roles,
    :readonly => true,
    :finder_sql => '
SELECT roles.name FROM roles
INNER JOIN responsibilities ON roles.id = responsibilities.role_id
INNER JOIN assigments ON responsibilities.group_id = assigments.group_id
WHERE assigments.user_id = #{id}
GROUP BY roles.id
  '

There is one realy big downside of using finder_sql – it does not work with find_by_… or named scopes, so this forced me to continue searching and this is the result:

  def roles
    Role.scoped(
     {
       :joins => { :responsibilities => { :group => { :assigments => :user } } },
       :conditions => {"users.id" => id},
       :group => "roles.id"
     }
   )
  end

and now I can write:

user.roles.by_name(:admin).count

where by_name is an named scope

  named_scope :by_name, lambda { |type| {:conditions => [ "roles.name = ", type.to_s ] } }

components:
5 leaves of lettuce
small onion
tomato
soured cucumber
can of tuna in oil (200g)
100-150ml of yogurt
to taste salt and pepper

preparation:
- wash lettuce and cut into small strips/squares
- cover the salad with finely chopped onion
- sprinkle onion with salt (quite a lot) and a bit of pepper
- then successively chop tomato and cucumber and arrange next layers
- at the end drain tuna of the oil, and gently disintegrating arrange the last layer
- cover everything with yogurt and at the end … mix everything :D

alternatively instead of using a lot of salt on each layer you could use a bit of salt on each layer separately those avoiding mixing.

While playing with next app I thought a bit about so common current_user … so a lot of tutorials and descriptions uses this method in application controller.

After thinking a while I found other way to do this, and for me it looks a bit better, any thoughts on it ?

So get started with User model:

class User < ActiveRecord::Base
acts_as_authentic
cattr_reader :current
end

Now in application controller add filter to set current user:

class ApplicationController < ActionController::Base
before_filter :set_user
private
def set_user
current_user_session = UserSession.find
User.send :class_variable_set, :@@current, current_user_session > current_user_session.record
end
end

Now you can use whatever you want the same method to access current user:

User.current

Added 2010.03.14 :
Warning please do not use this method it is not thread safe – it is only good for single threaded applications.

Working on my new app I thought it is necessary to get some data from configuration file, there was already plugin that had the necessary functionality – acts_as_configurable.

Unfortunately this plugin was not exactly what I was looking for It had possibility to write configuration in the class itself – I needed configuration in file.

So I did fork of the project, and now you have possibility to use rewritten version of the plugin which uses yaml file for storing configuration.

Here is example configuration file:

default:
  :first: 1st
Settings2:
  :first: 2nd
settings:
  :first: 3rd

With this configuration all the following definitions are valid:

class Settings1
  acts_as_configurable
end
class Settings2
  acts_as_configurable
end
class Settings30
  acts_as_configurable :for => 'settings'
end
class Settings31
  acts_as_configurable :for => :settings
end
class Settings4
  acts_as_configurable :for => Settings2
end
class Settings50
  acts_as_configurable 'conf'
end
class Settings51
  acts_as_configurable :conf
end
class Settings52
  acts_as_configurable :name=>'conf', :default=>'settings'
end
class Settings53
  acts_as_configurable :name=>:conf, :default=>'settings'
end
class Settings60
  acts_as_configurable :name=>'conf', :for => Settings1, :default=>'settings'
end
class Settings61
  acts_as_configurable :name=>'conf', :for => Settings1, :default=>:settings
end
class Settings7
  acts_as_configurable :name=>'conf', :for => Settings2, :default=>'settings'
end
class Settings8
  acts_as_configurable :name=>'conf1', :for => Settings1
  acts_as_configurable :name=>'conf2', :for => Settings2
end

and using following rspec code it will pass tests:

describe "ActsAsConfigurable" do
  it "should respond to 'configuration'" do
    Settings1.configuration.should_not be_nil
  end
  it "should contain default values" do
    Settings1 .configuration[:first].should eql '1st'
  end
  it "should contain values" do
    Settings2.configuration[:first].should eql "2nd"
  end
  it "should contain values for string" do
    Settings30.configuration[:first].should eql "3rd"
  end
  it "should contain values for symbol" do
    Settings31.configuration[:first].should eql "3rd"
  end
  it "should contain values for class" do
    Settings4.configuration[:first].should eql "2nd"
  end
  it "should contain values for object" do
    Settings2.new.configuration[:first].should eql "2nd"
  end
  it "should respond to 'conf' - passed as string" do
    Settings50 .conf[:first].should eql '1st'
  end
  it "should respond to 'conf' - passed as symbol" do
    Settings51 .conf[:first].should eql '1st'
  end
  it "should respond to 'conf' - passed as :name=>" do
    Settings52 .conf[:first].should eql '3rd'
  end
  it "should respond to 'conf' - passed as :name=>symbol" do
    Settings53 .conf[:first].should eql '3rd'
  end
  it "should work with other default - passed as string" do
    Settings60 .conf[:first].should eql '3rd'
  end
  it "should work with other default - passed as symbol" do
    Settings61 .conf[:first].should eql '3rd'
  end
  it "should work with other default but also exisitng for" do
    Settings7 .conf[:first].should eql '2nd'
  end
  it "should work with multiple definitions" do
    Settings8 .conf1[:first].should eql '1st'
    Settings8 .conf2[:first].should eql '2nd'
  end
end

Sources for the plugin are here http://github.com/mpapis/acts_as_configurable

Lately I’m using quite often very similar path for work with git, to not loose it with time, and of course to return my few bits to community I put my links here.

So my path of usage is

1. Setting up private git repository – I use my own server for trial projects, instructions for windows/github follow bellow,
2. Pushing & Pulling sources with remote git server – my instruction covers cloning remote repo but not connecting it with working sources, this instruction seams to cover it quite good,
3. How to use git the right way, as it is not so clear how to use git with branches, remote branches, merging, or overall project flow – I find this instruction quite good source of knowledge

If you use Windows or you are interested in hosting open source project then github.com should be worth trying with the following instruction: use github on windows.