Rails - Oct 2005 - initialize in helpers

Hi,

I have just upgraded to the latest version of rails and zero arg
initializers in helpers stopped working. ie I previously had something like

module CheeseHelper
def initialize
... init some vars etc ...
end
end

class GobbleController < ApplicationController
helper :cheese
end

But this will generate an exception down in the guts of the framework
because something has a 3-arg initialize or similar...

ie.

wrong number of arguments (3 for 0)

 <http://127.0.0.1:3000/login#>

c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/action_controller/base.rb:804:in
`initialize''
c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/action_controller/base.rb:804:in
`new''
c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/action_controller/base.rb:804:in
`initialize_template_class''
c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/action_controller/base.rb:357:in
`process_without_session_management_support''
c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/action_controller/session_management.rb:116:in
`process''
c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-0.14.1/lib/dispatcher.rb:36:in
`dispatch''
c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-0.14.1/lib/webrick_server.rb:117:in
`handle_dispatch''
c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-0.14.1/lib/webrick_server.rb:83:in
`service''
...


So how do you do initialization in the helpers?

Cheers,

Peter Donald


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On Oct 21, 2005, at 4:55 AM, Peter Donald wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I have just upgraded to the latest version of rails and zero arg  
> initializers in helpers stopped working. ie I previously had  
> something like
>
> module CheeseHelper
>   def initialize
>     ... init some vars etc ...
>   end
> end
>
> class GobbleController < ApplicationController
>   helper :cheese
> end
Hmm. By putting an initialize method in your helper, you were  
overriding the initialize method on the ActionView::Base class when  
the helper was included, which is not a good thing (especially since  
the initialize method is private and cannot be guaranteed to remain  
unchanged between releases).

Helpers ought to be stateless, but if you really need some persistent  
state available to a helper you can set them in instance variables on  
the controller, initialized via a before_filter or something.  
Instance variables in the controller are always made available to the  
view.

- Jamis
>
> But this will generate an exception down in the guts of the  
> framework because something has a 3-arg initialize or similar...
>
> ie.
> wrong number of arguments (3 for 0) c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/ 
> gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/action_controller/base.rb: 
> 804:in `initialize''
> c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/ 
> action_controller/base.rb:804:in `new''
> c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/ 
> action_controller/base.rb:804:in `initialize_template_class''
> c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/ 
> action_controller/base.rb:357:in  
> `process_without_session_management_support''
> c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/actionpack-1.10.1/lib/ 
> action_controller/session_management.rb:116:in `process''
> c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-0.14.1/lib/ 
> dispatcher.rb:36:in `dispatch''
> c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-0.14.1/lib/ 
> webrick_server.rb:117:in `handle_dispatch''
> c:/applications/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-0.14.1/lib/ 
> webrick_server.rb:83:in `service''
> ...
>
> So how do you do initialization in the helpers?
>
> Cheers,
>
> Peter Donald
>
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