Rails - Jul 2008 - DRYing my app

Hello.

I am using auto-complete fields in my application and I found myself
duplicating a lot of code.

Here is a sample of what I have in my view:

            <%= text_field_with_auto_complete :model,
              :codeA,
              :maxlength    => 35,
              :size         => 35,
              :frequency    => 0,
              :style        => ''off'',
              :autocomplete => ''off'' -%>
            <div class=auto_complete id=model_codeA_auto_complete
style=''display: none''></div>

            <%= text_field_with_auto_complete :model,
              :codeB,
              :maxlength    => 35,
              :size         => 35,
              :frequency    => 0,
              :style        => ''off'',
              :autocomplete => ''off'' -%>
            <div class=auto_complete id=model_codeB_auto_complete
style=''display: none''></div>

The models all look the same too:

class ModelA < ActiveRecord::Base
  self.table_name = ''modela''

  def self.get_codes
    return ModelA.find(
      :all,
      :select => ''code'',
      :order  => ''code''
    ).collect {|row| row.code}
  end
end

class ModelB < ActiveRecord::Base
  self.table_name = ''modelb''

  def self.get_codes
    return ModelB.find(
      :all,
      :select => ''code'',
      :order  => ''code''
    ).collect {|row| row.code}
  end
end

:   :   :  and so on...

The only thing that changes in the methods is the name of the model,
as you can see.

In my controller I have another set of methods to retrieve the
necessary information for the drop downs and auto-completes:

  def auto_complete_for_codeA
    @codes = ModelA.get_codes
    render_options(@codes, params[:model][:codeA])
  end

  def auto_complete_for_codeB
    @codes  = ModelB.get_codes
    render_options(@codes, params[:model][:codeB])
  end

:   :   :  and so on...

''render_options'' is another method that I got DRY enough and I
don''t
need to make any changes as of right now. It finds matching values in
@codes based on the second parameter value, then renders a partial.

As you can see there is a lot of duplication in all of this and I
would like to make it as DRY as possible. The only thing I think can
be done is to to modify all those controller methods by soft-coding
somehow the name of the Model to be used and get something like this:

  def auto_complete_for_codeA
    render_options(:ModelA, params[:model][:codeA])
  end

  def auto_complete_for_codeB
    render_options(:ModelB, params[:model][:codeB])
  end

Then render_option would do all the grunt work converting :myModelx to
a usable model name. If you know how to make this happen and/or have
better ideas please let me know.

Thanks a lot.

Pepe
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Hi Dale,

Sorry for the delay in responding. I''ve been quite busy these past
days.

Thanks for the idea. I think I understand the underlying purpose.
However, since nobody was answering this posting I decided to create a
new one with a simpler question and I got a few answers that really
helped me. I have not tried them yet but if you are interested, here
is the link:

http://groups.google.com/group/rubyonrails-talk/browse_thread/thread/51e90f981ca81f6a/afff04e37620922e?hl=en&lnk=gst&q=soft-coding#afff04e37620922e

Thanks again.

Pepe

On Jul 29, 9:42 am, Dale
<daleschaaf...-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> Sorry no solutions here, but a couple of thoughts that might end up
> sending you in the right direction. I''m still new to rails and
haven''t
> actually implemented anything like what you''re describing.
>
> If modelA & modelB only differ by an attribute, maybe inheritance is
> your answer..So something like:
>     class baseModel
>        basic_stuff_here
>     class modelA < baseModel
>        code method  # returns codeA
>     class modelB < baseModel
>        code method # returns codeB
>
> Then I''m wondering if the rails framework would support (I suspect
> somehow with routing it does) creating just the basemodel controller/
> view. In there everything would be ''the same'' just using
the inherited
> methods.
>
> Obviously this is an idea of where to go...I''m sure there are
> stumbling blocks on the way.
> -Dale
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