Rails - May 2005 - collection select form helpers in a partial?

I am having a hard time understanding how I would use the select form
helper in a situation where I have a collection of select boxes which
are being rendered by partials.

Problem #1 is that select uses instance variables whereas partials use
local variables so I think I''d need to convert local variables to
instance variables from in the partial itself, which seems wierd.

Problem #2 It isn''t very clear from the docs how collections of form
elements should be named in the html. If try to use the notation
model[id], the select tag freaks out:
   `@grant[8]'' is not allowed as an instance variable name
If I try to use the notation model_id than @params[:model] doesn''t
return the list of records for the model.

I can reinvent the wheel by manually creating the select tag with
content_tag and options_for_select, but this is counter intuitive
given the existence of the select helper. I suggest that it should
either be more flexible or should cease to exist since as it stands it
is only a source of confusion.

Unless I am missing something obvious (it has happened before :s )  it
seems that the select form helper needs a hard look before 1.0.


-- 
John-Mason Shackelford

Software Developer
Pearson Educational Measurement

2510 North Dodge St.
Iowa City, IA 52245
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john-mason.shackelford-uJfvbxoDSvxBDgjK7y7TUQ@public.gmane.org
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