Rails - Jan 2010 - Need some help understanding file_field and local_path

Hi all,

I''ve tried very hard to understand file_field and how to determine
local_path.  However, I''m running into some issues and I believe
it''s
probably due to the different behaviors of file_field and local_path
together.

First, here''s my issue.

I''m successfully parsing a yaml file using the following code
(supplying
only what''s necessary here):

http://gist.github.com/276841

I''ll describe what I''m doing step by step and what
I''ve accomplished so
far.

(The Task)

Admin user wants to upload a new theme.  A new theme houses the
following file/directory structure:

-- blue_lagoon (folder and the theme name)
  |
  -- images (folder)
  -- javascripts (folder)
  -- layouts (folder)
  -- stylesheets (folder)
  -- swfs (folder)
  blue_lagoon.yml (yaml config file that houses some information)

1.  Admin user goes to themes index and clicks new. (working)
2.  Admin user clicks browse and selects the blue_lagoon.yml file.
(working)
3.  Admin user clicks upload. (working)
4.  Many validation checks are performed to ensure that a yml file is
being selected, and that it contains all of the pertinent information.
If it fails validation, notifications are sent to the admin user.
(working)
5.  Once everything is validated, the yml file is moved by rails to a
temporary folder and parsed.  The information is then stored in a merged
parameter and sent to the model to be saved. (working)
6.  The theme model now contains a complete record of the
blue_lagoon.yml file. (working)
----- so far so good
----- here is where I''m running into some issues now
7.  Now I want to call an after_save method that will dir glob the
location that the (original) blue_lagoon.yml file was uploaded from, and
begin to mass create and upload the information to the public/themes
folder.

The problem is I don''t know how to find the local_path to the current
upload because rails moved it to the temp folder.  If I try:

@files = params[:theme_upload][:upload].local_path

.. it will return the temp directory path, not the true path.

Any help would be appreciated as well as any advice going forward on
this topic.

Thanks.
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On Jan 13, 11:22 pm, Alpha Blue
<li...-fsXkhYbjdPsEEoCn2XhGlw@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> 7.  Now I want to call an after_save method that will dir glob the
> location that the (original) blue_lagoon.yml file was uploaded from, and
> begin to mass create and upload the information to the public/themes
> folder.
>
> The problem is I don''t know how to find the local_path to the
current
> upload because rails moved it to the temp folder.
I''m confused. Rails saves the file in a temporary folder as soon as
the upload''s finished. (Also, under certain situations (which I
honestly don''t know off the top of my head) it might not bother with
the temporary file and store the uploaded data in a StringIO object.)
The file doesn''t exist on the server until the web server finishes
processing the post request, and Rails or Rack or whatever saves the
information where it wants. There is no "original" file.

Please correct me if I''m wrong, but it sounds like you want the path
of the file from the user''s machine?

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pharrington wrote:
> I''m confused. Rails saves the file in a temporary folder as soon
as
> the upload''s finished. (Also, under certain situations (which I
> honestly don''t know off the top of my head) it might not bother
with
> the temporary file and store the uploaded data in a StringIO object.)
> The file doesn''t exist on the server until the web server finishes
> processing the post request, and Rails or Rack or whatever saves the
> information where it wants. There is no "original" file.
> 
> Please correct me if I''m wrong, but it sounds like you want the
path
> of the file from the user''s machine?
That''s correct.

What I would like to do is mass upload everything that is globbed within 
that directory.  Therefore I need the exact path of the file where 
original uploading began.

Example:

I click upload:

I browse to a file located in say C:\myfolder\mytheme\mytheme.yml

The structure of that folder is:

C:\myfolder\mytheme\images\*
C:\myfolder\mytheme\layouts\*
C:\myfolder\mytheme\javascripts\*
C:\myfolder\mytheme\stylesheets\*
C:\myfolder\mytheme\swfs\*
C:\myfolder\mytheme\mytheme.yml

The first step was to read the mytheme.yml file as a manifest for what 
will be usable/uploaded for the theme.  In some cases, certain themes 
might not include swfs, javascripts, or even layouts.  The yml is read 
and placed into the database model as a record manifest for the theme.

After the yml manifest is saved, I want to go back to the original 
folder where the browse/upload began and then glob the structure to make 
sure it matches the manifest and then I''ll create directories in the 
public\themes folder of the application and copy the file structure from 
that root location exactly.

How can I accomplish this?  From other real-web examples, I see multiple 
file uploads but they all have javascript attached to them that provide 
multiple file_field inputs.  I''m looking to mass glob upload files
based
off a directory location.
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On Jan 14, 2:19 pm, Alpha Blue
<li...-fsXkhYbjdPsEEoCn2XhGlw@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> pharrington wrote:
> How can I accomplish this?  From other real-web examples, I see multiple
> file uploads but they all have javascript attached to them that provide
> multiple file_field inputs.  I''m looking to mass glob upload files
based
> off a directory location.
You can''t (at least not with plain html + javascript) - you
don''t have
access to the user''s filesystem. I think that HTML5 adds some stuff in
this area (not sure what changes are and what has actually been
implemented)

Fred
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Frederick Cheung wrote:
> On Jan 14, 2:19 pm, Alpha Blue
<li...-fsXkhYbjdPsEEoCn2XhGlw@public.gmane.org> wrote:
>> pharrington wrote:
> 
>> How can I accomplish this?  From other real-web examples, I see
multiple
>> file uploads but they all have javascript attached to them that provide
>> multiple file_field inputs.  I''m looking to mass glob upload
files based
>> off a directory location.
> 
> You can''t (at least not with plain html + javascript) - you
don''t have
> access to the user''s filesystem. I think that HTML5 adds some
stuff in
> this area (not sure what changes are and what has actually been
> implemented)
> 
> Fred
Thanks Fred, that''s what I thought.  Well that''s not a big
issue then.
In most cases if someone wanted to add a completely new theme to their 
site, they would have to upload the files themselves anyways.  As long 
as I''m able to see the yml manifest and understand what''s in
the theme
and how it''s being used, I should be okay.

Thanks for the clarification.

However, if someone has the time, I''d still like to know how I can find
the user directory that someone was attempting to load from.  I''d like 
to know this for future reference.

Take care.

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On Jan 14, 10:20 am, Alpha Blue
<li...-fsXkhYbjdPsEEoCn2XhGlw@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> Thanks for the clarification.
>
> However, if someone has the time, I''d still like to know how I can
find
> the user directory that someone was attempting to load from.  I''d
like
> to know this for future reference.
>
I don''t believe that most browsers send that info - as a matter of
fact, I believe that IE''s sending of a full path (rather than the
plain filename) is regarded as a bug, rather than a feature. See, for
example, this ticket:

http://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/FILEUPLOAD-122

(from Jboss, but I remember seeing a comment about this in paperclip/
attachment_fu/etc. as well)

--Matt Jones

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Alpha Blue wrote:
[...]
> However, if someone has the time, I''d still like to know how I can
find
> the user directory that someone was attempting to load from.  I''d
like
> to know this for future reference.
There is no reason that you or your app should have any interest in the 
particulars of your client''s filesystem.  It is, quite frankly, none of
your app''s business, just as your server''s filesystem is none
of the
client''s business.
> 
> Take care.
Best,
-- 
Marnen Laibow-Koser
http://www.marnen.org
marnen-sbuyVjPbboAdnm+yROfE0A@public.gmane.org
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On Fri, Jan 15, 2010 at 6:35 AM, Marnen Laibow-Koser
<lists-fsXkhYbjdPsEEoCn2XhGlw@public.gmane.org>wrote:
> Alpha Blue wrote:
> [...]
> > However, if someone has the time, I''d still like to know how
I can find
> > the user directory that someone was attempting to load from. 
I''d like
> > to know this for future reference.
>
> There is no reason that you or your app should have any interest in the
> particulars of your client''s filesystem.  It is, quite frankly,
none of
> your app''s business, just as your server''s filesystem is
none of the
> client''s business.
>
>
  Marnen is correct here. Please understand that while I understand that you
may be interested
in doing more work so the user does less - it is wiser to not get to
interested about the users filesystem
and I would encourage you to only accept ZIP files in this case and spend
the time validating the directory
structure and any requried files and assist the user via docs and or some
step by step wizard ( for newbs )
to make your theme file. I expect anyone that can make said theme is
actually very competent.

Know your audience.


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I don''t need to implement the upload feature for bulk files any longer.
All I use now is an upload to the yml configuration file for the theme. 
My question was asked more out of curiosity.  Rails needed to know the 
original path to move the file to the temporary path.  I was only 
curious what method(s) Rails used to perform that scenario.

But, again, I only asked out of curiosity.

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On Jan 15, 3:32 pm, Alpha Blue
<li...-fsXkhYbjdPsEEoCn2XhGlw@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> I don''t need to implement the upload feature for bulk files any
longer.
> All I use now is an upload to the yml configuration file for the theme.
> My question was asked more out of curiosity.  Rails needed to know the
> original path to move the file to the temporary path.  I was only
> curious what method(s) Rails used to perform that scenario.
>
It doesn''t - the webserver gets a stream of bytes from the client
(with some metadata) and plonks those bytes somewhere temporary (or
not at all for small uploads).

Fred
> But, again, I only asked out of curiosity.
>
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Not to mention, your code is on the server. You can''t access the
client''s file system from the server anyway. Dir.glob would fail
because you''d be globbing your own disk.

On Jan 15, 8:35 am, Marnen Laibow-Koser
<li...-fsXkhYbjdPsEEoCn2XhGlw@public.gmane.org>
wrote:
> Alpha Blue wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > However, if someone has the time, I''d still like to know how
I can find
> > the user directory that someone was attempting to load from.
 I''d like
> > to know this for future reference.
>
> There is no reason that you or your app should have any interest in the
> particulars of your client''s filesystem.  It is, quite frankly,
none of
> your app''s business, just as your server''s filesystem is
none of the
> client''s business.
>
>
>
> > Take care.
>
> Best,
> -- 
> Marnen Laibow-Koserhttp://www.marnen.org
> mar...-sbuyVjPbboAdnm+yROfE0A@public.gmane.org
> --
> Posted viahttp://www.ruby-forum.com/.
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Frederick Cheung wrote:
> It doesn''t - the webserver gets a stream of bytes from the client
> (with some metadata) and plonks those bytes somewhere temporary (or
> not at all for small uploads).
> 
> Fred
Thanks Fred, that satisfies my curiosity.

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