i?m fairly new to ruby... any suggestions getting the below to work... i?d like to use myfile_field.read within encodeVideo and then self.data = Student_Interviews.flv class Myfile < ActiveRecord::Base . . . def encodeVideo opts #, stream IO.popen(?ffmpeg #{opts}?, ?w?)#{ |io| io.puts stream} end def myfile=(myfile_field) if myfile_field and myfile_field.length > 0 encodeVideo ?-i /tmp/Student_Interviews.mov -ar 22050 -ab 64 -f flv -s 320?240 /tmp/Student_Interviews.flv?#, myfile_field.read #self.data = myfile_field.read self.filename = Myfile.base_part_of(myfile_field.original_filename) + Date.to_s filesize = (myfile_field.length / 1000).to_i if filesize == 0 self.filesize = 1 # a file of 0 KB doesn?t make sense else self.filesize = filesize end end end -- Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.