Rails - Jan 2011 - Is this thing here a helper or a model, or something else?

Hello,

for my Rails application I''m going to need a class that does timestamp
computations, e.g. "give me a list of all 5-minute-blocks for a certain
time range".

Example:

.set_start_time(''2011-01-13 12:00:00'')
.set_end_time(''2011-01-13 12:15:00'')
.get_time_blocks(5)

-> results in

[''2011-01-13 12:00:00'',
2011-01-13 12:05:00,
2011-01-13 12:10:00,
2011-01-13 12:15:00]

I''m having problems to decide what kind of class this should be in a
Rails application? It really is just a helper and not part of the
business logic, thus it could be a helper, but as far as I understand
helpers are for controllers and views, and this class is going to be
used by models. So, maybe it''s a model?

Thanks in advance,

--
 Manuel

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Manuel Kiessling wrote in post #974606:
> Hello,
>
> for my Rails application I''m going to need a class that does
timestamp
> computations, e.g. "give me a list of all 5-minute-blocks for a
certain
> time range".
>
> Example:
>
> .set_start_time(''2011-01-13 12:00:00'')
> .set_end_time(''2011-01-13 12:15:00'')
> .get_time_blocks(5)
>
> -> results in
>
> [''2011-01-13 12:00:00'',
> 2011-01-13 12:05:00,
> 2011-01-13 12:10:00,
> 2011-01-13 12:15:00]
>
> I''m having problems to decide what kind of class this should be in
a
> Rails application? It really is just a helper and not part of the
> business logic, thus it could be a helper, but as far as I understand
> helpers are for controllers and views, and this class is going to be
> used by models. So, maybe it''s a model?
>
I think it''s a model, or simply a utility class that goes in lib.

> Thanks in advance,
>
> --
>  Manuel
Best,
-- 
Marnen Laibow-Koser
http://www.marnen.org
marnen-sbuyVjPbboAdnm+yROfE0A@public.gmane.org

Sent from my iPhone

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These methods are not generating any HTML, so they should not be in a
view helper. Like you said, they are not needed for controller function,
so they shouldn''t be in the ApplicationController. So I would put them
in your model.

You can put this logic in a module in your lib/ directory. This way if
you need the code in different models, then you can just require/include
it.

module ChunkyTime

  def set_start_time ...
  def set_end_time ...
  def get_time_blocks ...

end

class MyModel
  include ChunkyTime

end

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Thanks guys, just learnt another "Ruby way" of doing stuff, you helped
a
lot!


Arailsdemo: "chunk" is a much better fitting name for what
I''m planning
to implement, thanks for this.

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If you haven''t worked with the lib/ directory before, make sure you
have

        config.autoload_paths += %W(#{config.root}/lib)

in config/application.rb

Also, if you ever want to make yourself a gem, you could do something
like

# lib/acts_as_chunky_time

module ActsAsChunkyTime

  def self.included(class_thats_including_my_module)
    class_thats_including_my_module.extend ClassMethods
  end

  module ClassMethods
    def acts_as_chunky_time
      include ActsAsChunkyTime::InstanceMethods
    end
  end

  module InstanceMethods
    def set_start_time ...
    def set_end_time ...
    def get_time_blocks ...
  end
end

ActiveRecord::Base.send(:include, ActsAsChunkyTime)


# my_model.rb

class MyModel < AR::Base
  acts_as_chunky_time
end




Manuel Kiessling wrote in post #974620:
> Thanks guys, just learnt another "Ruby way" of doing stuff, you
helped a
> lot!
>
>
> Arailsdemo: "chunk" is a much better fitting name for what
I''m planning
> to implement, thanks for this.
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Arailsdemo A. wrote in post #974689:
> If you haven''t worked with the lib/ directory before, make sure
you have
>
>         config.autoload_paths += %W(#{config.root}/lib)
>
> in config/application.rb
Or not.  You can also require your lib files explicitly if you''d
rather,
though autoloading is *very* convenient.

Best,
--
Marnen Laibow-Koser
http://www.marnen.org
marnen-sbuyVjPbboAdnm+yROfE0A@public.gmane.org

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I was thinking about this problem as it is very interesting to myself
being a relatively new ruby/rails programmer.  How about opening and
extending the range method to handle stepping through DateTimes.  Not
sure how to do this, but heres the idea:

span = DateTime.parse("2011-01-13
12:00:00")...DateTime.parse("2011-01-13 12:15:00")

span.step(5.minutes) { |s| p s } # the 5.minutes is not right though

# perhaps a custom function then?
span.step_every_five_minutes { |s| p s }

# This code to create the behavior would be placed in a patch file in
lib/
lib/range_patch.rb

class Range
...
end

Just brainstorming here : )

Jade

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