Rails - Jul 2006 - moving data from legacy database

I have rewritten a java webapp into rails.  The database structure is
basically the same except that:
1) in the legacy app, several of the tables did not use ID numbers,
but relied on other fields as the primary key
2) in the legacy app, there is a join table that uses email address
and category names to do the join, not ID numbers

I would like to move or change this database to match my new rails
schema.  Does anyone have any suggestions as to the easiest way to do
this?

Thanks ,
Shelby

On Sun, 2006-07-02 at 20:37 -0500, Shelby Westman wrote:
> I have rewritten a java webapp into rails.  The database structure is
> basically the same except that:
> 1) in the legacy app, several of the tables did not use ID numbers,
> but relied on other fields as the primary key
> 2) in the legacy app, there is a join table that uses email address
> and category names to do the join, not ID numbers
> 
> I would like to move or change this database to match my new rails
> schema.  Does anyone have any suggestions as to the easiest way to do
> this?
----
you can identify the primary keys in your legacy database like this
http://wiki.rubyonrails.org/rails/pages/HowToUseLegacySchemas

or you could create a new database and import your data from the old
into the new

the choice of course is yours - it does make rails easier to stay within
the normal conventions when you are learning but it''s flexible enough
to
play with the cards it is dealt.

Craig

I realized that I could add an ID column to the legacy tables simply
by doing an SQL alter table (using Cocoa MySQL), and making the id
column auto-increment.  voila - an id column.

So really all I face now is the join table.  I''ll have to figure out
that...

Shelby