Hi again,
I have these functions - about five of them - and they are all the exact
same code except for which object instances they are referencing. For
example, if I have a user object and each user can modify one of five
phone fields - home, work, cell, etc. - I would like to call one
function and just pass a varibale indicating which one I am modifying.
I tried something like the following with no luck:
def change_phone(variable)
....
@user."#{varibale}" = @phone
end
where variable was work, for example. But it throws an error "Unexpected
STRING_BEG". If there a way to do what I am doing? Thanks,
-S
--
Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
Hi -- On Fri, 11 Sep 2009, Shandy Nantz wrote:> > Hi again, > > I have these functions - about five of them - and they are all the exact > same code except for which object instances they are referencing. For > example, if I have a user object and each user can modify one of five > phone fields - home, work, cell, etc. - I would like to call one > function and just pass a varibale indicating which one I am modifying. > > I tried something like the following with no luck: > > def change_phone(variable) > .... > @user."#{varibale}" = @phone > end > > where variable was work, for example. But it throws an error "Unexpected > STRING_BEG". If there a way to do what I am doing? Thanks,Yes: @user.send("#{variable}=", @phone) David -- David A. Black | training Ruby Power and Light, LLC | consulting http://www.rubypal.com | mentoring book: "The Well-Grounded Rubyist" | code review http://www.manning.com/black2 | manuscript review
What if I wanted to use that passed in variable to check and see if the
field was blank or simple reference the value that that field held and
not assign it a value?
For example:
if @user."#{params[:variable]}".blank?
...
end
where params[:variable] = "home_phone". I would want that to translate
to @user.home_phone.blank? Is there a way to do that?
Thanks in advance,
-S
--
Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
Shandy Nantz wrote:> What if I wanted to use that passed in variable to check and see if the > field was blank or simple reference the value that that field held and > not assign it a value? > > For example: > > if @user."#{params[:variable]}".blank? > ... > end > > where params[:variable] = "home_phone". I would want that to translate > to @user.home_phone.blank? Is there a way to do that?Well, the send() syntax that David mentioned would work for that, but if @user is an ActiveRecord object, then you can also pretend it''s a hash and do @user[params[:variable]] . The fact that you''re asking these questions indicates that you need to review your basic Ruby and Rails topics. These are elementary questions.> > Thanks in advance, > > -SBest, -- Marnen Laibow-Koser http://www.marnen.org marnen-sbuyVjPbboAdnm+yROfE0A@public.gmane.org -- Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
Marnen Laibow-Koser wrote:> Well, the send() syntax that David mentioned would work for that, but if > @user is an ActiveRecord object, then you can also pretend it''s a hash > and do @user[params[:variable]] .Thanks for the reply, your suggestion did indeed work.> The fact that you''re asking these questions indicates that you need to > review your basic Ruby and Rails topics. These are elementary > questions. >And the last time I checked this forum was open to anybody that wanted to ask a legitimate RoR question - noobie or otherwise - and while I will admit that I am no ruby expert I am far from a noobie. I have answered many questions for beginners of this forum without pointing out that "[t]hese are elementary questions" or saying that "you need to review your basic Ruby and Rails topics." I have done this because I was once where many people who come to this forum are - without a clue in the world and simply trying to better my skill set in the programming field by trying to learn something knew, and, in my opinion, pretty freakin'' cool. Moreover, I have found this forum extremely helpful and an extremely valuable resource because I have felt comfortable to ask questions that I didn''t know the answer to - beginner or no - without people openly degrading me or other people by saying. . . well, what you said in your reply. If I had ever thought that for one moment, that somebody was asking a question that anybody who had read the first 5 pages of a beginning RoR book should, you know what, I kept it to myself. -- Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
Shandy Nantz wrote:> Hi again, > > I have these functions - about five of them - and they are all the exact > same code except for which object instances they are referencing. For > example, if I have a user object and each user can modify one of five > phone fields - home, work, cell, etc. - I would like to call one > function and just pass a varibale indicating which one I am modifying.This is not a direct answer to your question since the answer has already been provided. But, I just wanted to point out that you might be struggling with this because your model breaks the First Normal Form (1NF) of database design, which states that a table should contain no repeating groups. In this case the repeating groups would be home_phone, work_phone cell_phone, etc. These are all phone numbers making up a repeating group and should, technically, be normalized, which also cleanly solves the problem at hand. phones id | person_id | label | number 1 | 1 | home | 555-123-1234 2 | 1 | work | 555-123-2345 -- Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.