Rails Copying attributes from User object to new object - ruby-on-rails

Question

In the User model I have an archive! method that is called when a User is destroyed. This action creates a new ArchivedUser in separate table.
The ArchivedUser is successfully created, but the way I am manually setting each value is pretty dirty; if a new column is added to the User table it must be added here as well.
I tried to select and slice the attributes, but got undefined local variable or methoduser'`
ArchivedUser.create(user.attributes.select{ |key, _| ArchivedUser.attribute_names.include? key })
ArchivedUser.create(user.attributes.slice(ArchivedUser.attribute_names))
How can I iterate through each attribute in the User table when creating an ArchivedUser with self?
def archive!
if ArchivedUser.create(
user_id: self.id,
company_id: self.company_id,
first_name: self.first_name,
last_name: self.last_name,
email: self.email,
encrypted_password: self.encrypted_password,
password_salt: self.password_salt,
session_token: self.session_token,
perishable_token: self.perishable_token,
role: self.role,
score: self.score,
created_at: self.created_at,
updated_at: self.updated_at,
api_key: self.api_key,
device_id: self.device_id,
time_zone: self.time_zone,
device_type: self.device_type,
verified_at: self.verified_at,
verification_key: self.verification_key,
uninstalled: self.uninstalled,
device_details: self.device_details,
is_archived: self.is_archived,
registered_at: self.registered_at,
logged_in_at: self.logged_in_at,
state: self.state,
creation_state: self.creation_state,
language_id: self.language_id,
offer_count: self.offer_count,
expired_device_id: self.expired_device_id,
unique_id: self.unique_id,
best_language_code: self.best_language_code,
offer_id: self.offer_id,
vetted_state: self.vetted_state,
photo_path: self.photo_path
)
self.is_archived = true
self.email = "#{self.email}.archived#{Time.now.to_i}"
self.encrypted_password = nil
self.password_salt = nil
self.session_token = nil
self.perishable_token = nil
self.device_id = nil
self.verification_key = nil
self.save!
self.update_column(:api_key, nil)
UserGroup.delete_all(:user_id => self.id)
else
# handle the ArchivedUser not being created properly
end
end
Thanks for viewing :)
Update:
We were able to figure out the reasons why ArchivedUser.create(self.attributes.slice!(ArchivedUser.attribute_names) wasn't working. The first reason is the create method requires "bang" to write the object. The second reason was that ArchivedUser has a user_id field, that User doesn't receive until after create. We have to set the user_id: manually with merge(user_id: self.id)
The final output looks like
ArchivedUser.create!(self.attributes.slice!(ArchivedUser.attribute_names).merge(user_id: self.id))

Answer 1

You were on the right track with the first implementation. You just have to use self instead of user.
ArchivedUser.create(self.attributes.slice(ArchivedUser.attribute_names))

Answer 2

If you just want to have a copy of the user that is being archived, I think an elegant way would be to do
archived_user = user_to_be_archived.dup
or you can take a look at the amoeba gem, this will do all the heavy lifting including associations if you want.
https://github.com/amoeba-rb/amoeba