Rails - Mar 2006 - combining STI + polymorphism + rich self HABTM : how to ?

Hi all,

I need to model simple typed polymorphic relations:

    ''John''  [''works_for'']
''Bill''
    ''John'' [''speaks_for'']
''Microsoft''
    ''Microsoft'' [''hold_shares_of'']
''Apple''


I''m having a hard time combining :
   - S.T.I.       : ''people'' and ''companies''
are different kind of
''entities'' that can relate to other
''entities''
   - polymorphism self-ref HABTM (a person is related to another person 
OR to a company)
   - rich HABTM        : relations are typed (''can_speak_for'',
''works_for'', ''works_with'',
''knows'', ..)

I have already used those techniques separatedly, but combining them is 
another story!!


What I have :
***************

STI models:
-------------
   The main actors are People and Companies.
   They have a lot of common data and represent a common concept: Entity

   class Entity  < ActiveRecord::Base
   class Person  < Entity
   class Company < Entity


table "relations"
------------------
   #  of_id               :integer(11)   = the left party: john, MSFT
   #  of_type             :string(20)

   #  with_id             :integer(11)   = the right party..
   #  with_type           :string(20)

   #  relation_type_id    :integer(11)   = L.U.T: "works_for",
"knows"

relationship models
----------------
   class Relation < AR::B
   class RelationType < AR::B



What I don''t know:
*****************
How to associate all those pieces?
(belongs_to, has_many, :as => ..., :foreign_key, ...)

I''m lost. Help. 911
Thanks in advance.

Alain

-- 
Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.