Rails - Jan 2006 - Creating a model that acts as a settings manager

Hi,

I was wondering how could you create a model that is tied to all the 
records in one table, and retrieves the values of all records on first 
load, and also handles the updating of its values.

For example, suppose I have this table:

id INT(11) PK
group CHAR(40)
name CHAR(40)
value CHAR(128)
updated_at DATETIME

Sample rows:
group   name   value
---------------------------
main   something   123
users   expire   45

Then, I''d like very much to do something like this in Rails:

Settings.main.something = 34
a = Settings.users.expire

And also being able to override default behaviors, because maybe I''d 
want to do something special each time a specific setting is changed.

Currently, I''m just defining a method for each setting, but I keep 
thinking there must be a better way.

Thanks in advance!

- Ivan V.

i might suggest using the magic ''type'' column instead of group

id int PK
name varchar(40)
type varchar(40) #magic column
value varchar(40)

class Setting < AR::Base
end

class  MainSetting < Setting
end

class UserSetting < Setting
end

class SomeOtherSetting < Setting
end

# and so on for all your setting types

a = MainSetting.create(:name => "something", "value"
=> "34")
b = UserSetting.find_by_name("expire") # a.value = 45

I''m not saying what you want to do can or cannot be done, I just think
it
would be more work than just doing it the ''Rails Way''

Chris

On 1/4/06, Iv?n Vega Rivera <ivanvega@gmail.com>
wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I was wondering how could you create a model that is tied to all the
> records in one table, and retrieves the values of all records on first
> load, and also handles the updating of its values.
>
> For example, suppose I have this table:
>
> id INT(11) PK
> group CHAR(40)
> name CHAR(40)
> value CHAR(128)
> updated_at DATETIME
>
> Sample rows:
> group   name   value
> ---------------------------
> main   something   123
> users   expire   45
>
> Then, I''d like very much to do something like this in Rails:
>
> Settings.main.something = 34
> a = Settings.users.expire
>
> And also being able to override default behaviors, because maybe
I''d
> want to do something special each time a specific setting is changed.
>
> Currently, I''m just defining a method for each setting, but I keep
> thinking there must be a better way.
>
> Thanks in advance!
>
> - Ivan V.
>
> _______________________________________________
> Rails mailing list
> Rails@lists.rubyonrails.org
> http://lists.rubyonrails.org/mailman/listinfo/rails
>
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Thanks for your insight, I think I''ll go with it.

Ivan V.

Chris Hall wrote:
> i might suggest using the magic ''type'' column instead of
group
>
> id int PK
> name varchar(40)
> type varchar(40) #magic column
> value varchar(40)
>
> class Setting < AR::Base
> end
>
> class  MainSetting < Setting
> end
>
> class UserSetting < Setting
> end
>
> class SomeOtherSetting < Setting
> end
>
> # and so on for all your setting types
>
> a = MainSetting.create(:name => "something", "value"
=> "34")
> b = UserSetting.find_by_name("expire") # a.value = 45
>
> I''m not saying what you want to do can or cannot be done, I just
think
> it would be more work than just doing it the ''Rails Way''
>
> Chris
>
> On 1/4/06, *Iv?n Vega Rivera* <ivanvega@gmail.com 
> <mailto:ivanvega@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>     Hi,
>
>     I was wondering how could you create a model that is tied to all the
>     records in one table, and retrieves the values of all records on first
>     load, and also handles the updating of its values.
>
>     For example, suppose I have this table:
>
>     id INT(11) PK
>     group CHAR(40)
>     name CHAR(40)
>     value CHAR(128)
>     updated_at DATETIME
>
>     Sample rows:
>     group   name   value
>     ---------------------------
>     main   something   123
>     users   expire   45
>
>     Then, I''d like very much to do something like this in Rails:
>
>     Settings.main.something = 34
>     a = Settings.users.expire
>
>     And also being able to override default behaviors, because maybe
I''d
>     want to do something special each time a specific setting is changed.
>
>     Currently, I''m just defining a method for each setting, but I
keep
>     thinking there must be a better way.
>
>     Thanks in advance!
>
>     - Ivan V.
>
>     _______________________________________________
>     Rails mailing list
>     Rails@lists.rubyonrails.org <mailto:Rails@lists.rubyonrails.org>
>     http://lists.rubyonrails.org/mailman/listinfo/rails
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
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>